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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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THE 



BIBLE OF BIBLES; 



OR, 



&tDenig-0euen "2Dimne HeueiaticmB: 



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CONTAINING 

A DESCRIPTION OF TWENTY-SEVEN BIBLES, AND AN 

EXPOSITION OF TWO THOUSAND BIBLICAL 

ERRORS IN SCIENCE, HISTORY, MORALS, 

RELIGION, AND GENERAL EVENTS; 

ALSO A DELINEATION OF THE CHARACTERS OF 

THE PEINCIPAL PEESONAGES OP THE CHEISTIAN BIBLE, 



AN EXAMINATION OF THEIR DOCTRINES. 



BY , 

/? KERSEY GRAVES, 

/ *\ 

AUTHOR OF "THE WORLD'S SIXTEEN CRUCIFIED SAVIORS," AND 
j*J 2 "THE BIOGRAPHY OP SATAN." 



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K_ 



BOSTON: 
COLBY & RICH, PUBLISHERS, 

No. 9 Montgomery Place. 
1879. 

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1^1 






Copyright, 1879, 
BY LYDIA M. GRAVES, 

AS8ISTANT AUTHORESS. 



I B1 A ttl< ii, 
STEKi no BLIOTBOTTF9B0, 

BOI i 



G?^ 



LIST OF CONTENTS. 



. f 



PAGE 

The Leading Positions op this Work 9 

CHAPTER I. 

The Signs of the Times. — The Coming Revolution. — Reason 

will soon triumph 11 

CHAPTER II. 

Apology and Explanation. — Jehovah not our God. — Relation- 
ship of the Old and New Testaments . . . . .17 

CHAPTER III. 

Why this Work was written. — The Moral Truths of the 
Bible. — Why resort to Ridicule. — The Principal Design 
of this Work. — Don't read Pernicious Books. — Two Thou- 
sand Bible Errors exposed. — All Bibles Useful in their . 
Place 20 

CHAPTER IV. 
Beauties and Benefits of Bibles.— A Higher Plane of Devel- 
opment has been Attained. — Bible Writers Honest.— 
General Claims of Bibles . 28 

TWENTY-SEVEN BIBLES DESCRIBED. 

CHAPTER V. 
The Hindoo Bibles. — The Vedas. — The Code of Menu. — Ram- 
ayana. — mahabarat. — the purans. — analogies of the 
Hindoo and Jewish Religions. — Antiquity of India . . 32 

CHAPTER VI. 

The Egyptian Bible, "The Hermas." — Analogies of the Egyp- 
tian and Jewish Religions. — Antiquity of Egypt . . 42 



4 LIST OF CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VII. 

PAGE 

The Persian Bibles. — The Zenda A vesta. — The Sadder. — Anal- 
ogies of the Persian and Jewish Religions. —Antiquity op 
Persia 46 

CHAPTER VIII. 

The Chinese Bibles. — Ta-Heo (Great Learning). — The Chun 
Yung ; or, Doctrine of the Mean. — The Book of Mang, or 
Mencius. — Shoo King; or, "Book of History." — Shee 
King; or, "Book of Poetry." — Chun Tsen, "Spring and 
Summer." — Tao-te King ; or, Doctrine of Reason. — Analo- 
gies of the Chinese and Jewish Religions. — Antiquity of 
China 50 

CHAPTER IX. 

Seven other Oriental Bibles. — The Soffees' Bible: The "Mus- 
navi." — The Parsees' Bible: The " Bour Desch." — The 
Tamalese Bible: The " Kaliwakam." — The Scandinavian 
Bible: The "Saga;" or, Divine Wisdom. —The Kalmucs' 
Bible : The " Kalio Cham." — The Athenians' Bible : " The 
Testament." — The Cabalists' Bible: The " Yohar ; " or, 
Book of Light 55 

CHAPTER X. 

The Mahometan's Bible : TnE "Koran." — The Mormons' Bible : 
"The Book of Mormon." — Revelations of Joseph Smith. 
— The Shakers' Bible: "The Divine Roll" .... 57 

CHAPTER XI. 
Tin: Jews' Bible: The Old Testament a\d the Mishna . . 61 

CHAPTER XII. 
The Christians' Bible: fcra Character 62 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Genebal Analogies of Bibles. — Superior Features of the 

Heathen Bibles 65 

CHAPTER XIV. 

Tin: Infipj.l-' BlBLE 68 



LIST OF CONTENTS. 5 

TWO THOUSAND BIBLE ERRORS — OLD-TESTAMENT 
DEPARTMENT. 

CHAPTER XV. 

PAGE 

A Hundred and Twenty-three Errors in the Jewish Cosmogony. 

— The Scientists' Story of Creation . . . . . .73 

CHAPTER XVI. 
Numerous Absurdities in the Story of the Deluge . . V ^-^ST 

CHAPTER XVII. 
The Ten Commandments, Moral Defects of ... 96 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

Ten Foolish Bible Stories : A Talking Serpent and a Talking 
Ass. — The Story of Cain. — The Ark of the Covenant. — 
Korah, Dathan, and Abiram. — Daniel and Nebuchad- 
nezzar. — Sodom and Gomorrah. — The Tower of Babel.— 
Stopping the Sun and Moon. — Story of Samson. — Story 
of Jonah . . . . . . 100 

CHAPTER XIX. 
Bible Prophecies not Fulfilled ........ 121 

CHAPTER XX. 
Bible Miracles, Erroneous Belief in 124 

CHAPTER XXI. 
Bible Errors in Facts and Figures 128 

CHAPTER XXII. 
Bible Contradictions (232) 134 

CHAPTER XXIII. 
Obscene Language of the Bible (200 cases) . . . . .145 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

Circumcision a Heathenish Custom. — Fasting and Feasting in 

Various Nations . 149 

CHAPTER XXV. 
Holy Mountains, Lands, Cities, and Rivers 151 



6 LIST OF CONTENTS. 

BIBLE CHARACTERS. 

CHAPTER XXVI. page 

Jehovah, Character of 153 

CHAPTER XXVII. 
The Jews, Character of 157 

CHAPTER XXVIII. 
Moses, Character of 160 

CHAPTER XXIX. 
The Patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Character of . 166 

CHAPTER XXX. 
David: His Numerous Crimes. — Solomon, Character of. — Lot 

and his Daughters 173 

CHAPTER XXXI. 
The Prophets : Their Moral Defects. — Special Notice of Eli- 
jah and Elisha 177 

CHAPTER XXXII. 

Idolatry : Its Nature, Harmlessness, and Origin. — All Chris- 
tians either Atheists or Idolaters 187 

BIBLE ERRORS — NEW-TESTAMENT DEPARTMENT. 

CHAPTER XXXIII. 
Divine Revelation Impossible and Unnecessary .... 212 

CHAPTER XXXIV. 
PBDfBYAL Innocency of Man not True 219 

CHAPTER XXXV. 
ORIGINAL Sin and Fall OF MAN not True 222 

CHAPTER XXXVI. 
Mui;\i, Depravity of M\n a Delusion 224 

CHAPTER XXXVII. 
Fi:i:i: A MORAL ACCOUNTABILITY ERRONEOUS . . . 227 

CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
Kir : The Doctrine Erroneous 231 



LIST OF CONTENTS. 7 

CHAPTER XXXIX. page 

Forgiveness for Sin an Erroneous Doctrine 236 

CHAPTER XL. 
An Angry God, Evils of the Belief in 239 

CHAPTER XLI. 
Atonement for Sin an Immoral Doctrine .... • . 242 

CHAPTER XLII. 
Special Providences an Erroneous Doctrine 246 

CHAPTER XLIII. 
Faith and Belief: Bible Errors respecting 250 

CHAPTER XLIV. 
A Personal God Impossible 253 

Note. — In the twelve preceding chapters it is shown that the cardinal doctrines of 
Christianity are all wrong. 

CHAPTER XLV. 
Evil, Natural and Moral, explained 255 

CHAPTER XLYI. 
A Rational View of Sin and its Consequences .... 261 

CHAPTER XLVII. 
The Bible sanctions every Species of Crime ..... 266 

CHAPTER XL VIII. 
The Immoral Influence of the Bible ...... 285 

CHAPTER XLIX. 

The Bible at War with Eighteen Sciences . 287 

CHAPTER L. 
The Bible as a Moral Necessity 296 

CHAPTER LI. 
Send no more Bibles to the Heathen 303 

CHAPTER LIT. 
What shall We do to be Saved? ....... 307 

CHAPTER LIII. 
The Three Christian Plans of Salvation 334 



8 LIST OF CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER LIV. page 

The True Religion defined 352 

CHAPTER LV. 

' All Scripture given by Inspiration of God " . . . .356 

CHAPTER LVI. 
Infidelity in Oriental Nations : India, Rome, Greece, Egypt, 

China, Persia, and Arabia 368 

CHAPTER LVII. 

Sects, Schisms, and Skeptics in Christian Countries . . . 378 

CHAPTER LVIII. 
Modern Christianity one-half Infidelity 384 

CHAPTER LIX. 
The Christians' God, Character of 399 

CHAPTER LX. 

The One Hundred and Fifty Errors of Jesus Christ . . . 401 

CHAPTER LXI. 
Character and Erroneous Doctrines of the Apostles . . 407 

CHAPTER LXII. 
Erroneous Doctrines and Moral Defects of Paul and Peter . 408 

CHAPTER LXIII. 
Idolatrous Veneration for Bibles: Its Evils .... 420 

CHAPTER LXIV. 
Spiritual ob Implied Sense of Bibles: Its Objects . . .425 

CHAPTER LXV. 
What shall \vl lUBSTTTUTE FOB hie Bible? 432 

CHAPTER LXVI. 
Religious i: ^tion ; or, the Moral Necessity for a 

BeliOIOUI Reform 433 

Conclusion 437 



THE LEADING POSITIONS OF THIS WORK, 



We maintain, 1st, That man's mental faculties are 
susceptible of a threefold division and classification, as 
follows: First, the intellectual department; second, the 
moral and religious department ; third, the animal depart- 
ment (which includes also the social). 

2d, That all Bibles and religions are an outgrowth 
from some or all of these faculties, and hence of natural 
origin. 

3d, That all Bibles and religions which originated prior 
to the dawn of civilization in the country which gave them 
birth (i.e., prior to the reign of moral and physical science) 
are an emanation from the combined action and co-opera- 
tion of man's moral, religious, and animal feelings and pro- 
pensities. 

4th, That the Christian Bible contains (as shown in this 
work) several thousand errors, — moral, religious, histori- 
cal, and scientific. 

5th, That this fact is easily accounted for by observing 
that it originated at a period when the moral and religious 
feelings of the nation which produced it co-operated with 
the animal propensities instead of an enlightened intellect. 

6th, That, although such a Bible and religion may have 
been adapted to the minds which originated them, the 
higher class of minds of the present age demands a religion 



10 



THE LEADING POSITIONS OF THIS WORK. 



which shall call into exercise the intellect, instead of the 
animal propensities. 

7th, That, as all the Bibles and religions of the past are 
more of an emanation from the animal propensities than 
the intellect, they are consequently not suited to this age, 
and are for this reason being rapidly abandoned. 

8th, That true religion consists in the true exercise of 
the moral and religious faculties. 

9th, As the Christian Bible is shown in this work to 
inculcate bad morals, and to sanction, apparently, every 
species of crime prevalent in society in the age in which it 
was written, the language of remonstrance is frequently 
employed against placing such a book in the hands of the 
heathen, or the children of Christian countries ; and more 
especially against making " the Bible the fountain of our 
laws and the supreme rule of our conduct," and acknowl- 
edging allegiance to its God in the Constitution of the 
United States, as recommended by the American Christian 
Alliance. Such measures, this work shows by a thousand 
facts, would be a deplorable check to the moral and in- 
tellectual progress of the world. 

10th, If any clergyman or Christian professor shall take 
any exceptions to any position laid down in this work, 
the author will discuss the matter with him in a friendly 
manner in the papers, or through the post-office, or before 
a public audience. 

Kersey Graves. 

Richmond, Indiana. 



THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE SIGNS OP THE TIMES. 

We live in the most important age in the history of the world. 
No age preceding it was marked with such signal events. No 
other era in the history of civilization has been characterized by 
such agitation of human thought ; such a universal tendency 
to investigation ; such a general awakening upon all important 
subjects of human inquiry ; such a determination to grow in 
knowledge, and cultivate the immortal intellect, and mount to 
higher plains of development. The world of mind is in com- 
motion. All civilized nations are agitated from center to cir- 
cumference with the great questions of the age. And what 
does all this prove ? Why, that man is a progressive being ; 
that the tendency of the human mind is onward and upward ; 
and that it will not always consent to be bound down in igno- 
rance and superstition. And, thanks to the genius of the 
age, it is the prophecy of the glorious reformation and regene- 
ration of society, — an index of a happier era in the history of 
the human race. Old institutions are crumbling, and tumbling 
to the ground. The iron bands of creeds and dogmas, with 
which the people have been, so long bound down, are bursting 
asunder, and permitting them, to walk upright, and do their own 
thinking. In every department of science, in every arena of 
human thought and every theater of human actipn, we see a 
progressive spirit, we behold a disposition to lay aside the tra- 
il 



12 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

ditions and superstitions of the past, and grasp the living facts 
of the age. We everywhere see a disposition to abandon the 
defective institutions, political and religious, which were gotten 
up in the childhood of human experience, and supplant them 
with those better adapted to the wants of the age. In a word, 
there is everj'where manifested a disposition and determination 
to unshackle the human bocty, and set free the human mind, and 
place it with its living aspirations on the road to the temple of 
Truth. An evidence of the truth of these statements the reader 
can gather by casting his eyes abroad, or by reading the peri- 
odicals of the day. At this Yerj time nearly all the orthodox 
churches are in a state of commotion. The growing light and 
intelligence of the age, penetrating their dark creeds and dog- 
mas, are producing a sort of moral effervescence. The question 
of u hell" is now the agitating theme of the churches. Pos- 
terity will ridicule us, and class us with the unenlightened 
heathen, for discussing a question so far behind the times, and 
one so childish and so absurd in this intelligent and enlightened 
age. To condescend to discuss such a question now must be 
hell enough for scientific and intelligent minds. And other 
important religious events mark the age. When the Roman- 
Catholic Church, through its Ecumenical Council, dragged the 
Pope from his lofty throne of usurped power, and robbed him 
of his attribute of infallibility, it proclaimed the cfowmfall of the 
Pope and the death-Jcnell of the Church. Already thousands 
of his subjects refuse longer to bow down and kiss the big toe 
of his sacred majesty. His scepter has departed, his spiritual 
power is gone, his temporal power is waning. And the same 
spirit of agitation is operating as a leaven in the Protestant 
churches also. All the orthodox churches arc declining and 
growing weaker by their members falling off. The Methodist 
Church has recently lost more than two hundred of its preachers ; 
and the Baptist Church, according to the statement of a recent 
number of M The Christian Bra/' lias lost twenty-two thousand 
of its members within a period of five years. The agitation in 
the churches is driving thousands from their ranks, while many 
who remain are becoming more liberal-minded. The orthodox 
(Quaker Church has, in many localities, " run clear off the track. " 



THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 13 

It has abandoned its old time-honored peculiarities in dress and 
language, once deemed by them sacred, and essential to true god- 
liness. The use of " thee " and " thou " is laid aside by many 
of its members ; and even leading members have given up the 
" shad-bellied coat," and the round-crowned hat with a brim 
broad enough to " cover a multitude of sins." They no longer 
wait for " the Holy Ghost " to move them to preach ; but, as a 
member once remarked, u they go it on their own hook, like the 
Methodists, hit or miss." Music, once regarded by many of 
them as an emanation from " an emissary of the Devil," is now 
admitted into many of their churches. Thus it will be seen they 
are making some progress. The light without is benefiting 
them more than u the light within." All the orthodox systems 
committed a fatal error at the outset in assuming that their 
religions were derived directly from God, and consequently 
must be perfect and unalterable, and a finality in moral and 
religious progress. Such an assumption will cause the downfall, 
sooner or later, of any religious body which persists in propa- 
gating the error. Religious institutions, like all other institu- 
tions, are subject to the laws of growth and decay. Hence, if 
their doctrines and creeds are not improved occasionally to 
make them conform to the growing light and intelligence of the 
age and the principles of science, they will fall behind the 
times, cease to answer the moral and religious wants of the 
age, and become a stumbling-block in the path of progress. 
Common sense would teach us that the doctrines preached by 
the churches two hundred years ago must be as much out of 
place now as the wooden shoes and bearskin coats worn by the 
earl} 7 disciples would be for us. Their spiritual food is by no 
means adapted to our moral and religious wants. We are under 
no more moral and religious obligation whatever to preach the 
doctrines of original sin, the fall of man, endless punishment, in- 
fant damnation, &c, because our religious forefathers believed in 
these doctrines, than we are morally bound to eat beetles, locusts, 
and grasshoppers, because our Jewish ancestors feasted on these 
nasty vermin, as we learn by reading Lev. xi. Why is it that 
in modern times there has arisen great complaint in all the 
orthodox churches about the rapid inroads of infidelity into 



14 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES, 

their ranks? It is simply because, that while the people are 
beginning to assume the libert}^ to do their own thinking, the 
churches refuse to recognize the great principle of universal 
progress as applicable to their religion, which would and should 
keep their doctrines and precepts improved up to the times. 
Instead of adopting this wise policy, they try to compel their 
members to be content with the old stale salt junk of by- 
gone ages, in the shape of dilapidated, outgrown creeds and 
dogmas ; but it will not do. It is as difficult to keep great 
minds tied down to unprogressive creeds as it would be to keep 
grown-up boys and girls in baby-jumpers. Enlightened nations 
are as capable of making their own religion as their own 
laws ; that is, of making its tenets conform to the natural out- 
growth of their religious feelings as they become more ex- 
panded and enlightened. And it is a significant historical 
fact, that great minds in all religious nations have wholly or 
partially outgrown and abandoned the current and popular 
religions of the country. It is only moral cowards, or the igno- 
rant and uninformed, who throw themselves into the lap of the 
Church, and depend upon the priest to pilot them to heaven. 
Moses, Jesus Christ, Mahomet, Martin Luther, John Wesley, 
Emanuel Swedenborg, George Fox, Elias Hicks, and many 
other superior minds, strove hard unconsciously to rise above 
tiie religion in which they were educated ; and all succeeded in 
making some improvement in its stereotyped doctrines or prac- 
tices. The implied assumption of the churches, that their 
duct rincs and precepts are too perfect to be improved and too 
sacred to be investigated, and their Bible too holy to be criti- 
ontradicted both by history and science; and this 
false assumption has already driven many of the best minds of 
the age from their ranks. Theodore Parker declared that all 
the men of great intellects had left the Church in his time, 
because, instead of improving their religion to keep it up to the 
times, they bolt their doors, and hang curtains over their win- 
dows to keep out the light of the age. There could not be one 
inch of progress made in any thing in a thousand years with 
the principle of non-progression in religion adopted by the 
churches ; for, if it will apply to religion, it will apply with still 



THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 15 

greater force to every thing else : and hence it would long ago 
have put a dead lock upon all improvement, had it not been 
counteracted by outside counter-influences. It is because a 
large portion, and the most enlightened portion, of the community 
have assumed the liberty and moral independence to think and 
act for themselves, that society has made any progress either in 
science, morals, or religion. A religion which sedulously 
opposes its own improvement can do nothing essential toward 
improving any thing else, unless forced into it by outside influ- 
ences ; and it can not feel a proper degree of interest in those 
improvements essential to the progress of society. On the con- 
trary, it must check the growth of every thing it touches with 
its palsied hands. Here we can see the reason that no church 
in any age of the world has inaugurated any great system of 
reform for the improvement of society, but has made war on 
nearly every reform set on foot by that class of people which it 
has chosen to stigmatize as " infidels." Such a religion will 
decline and die in the exact ratio of the enlightenment and 
progress of societ}^. 

The Coming Revolution. 

That there is a general state of unrest in the public mind, at 
the present time, on the subject of religion, must be apparent to 
every observing person. Theological questions, long since re- 
garded as settled for ever, are being overhauled and discussed 
with a freedom and general interest far transcending that known 
or practically realized at any previous period. This is premoni- 
tive of a speedy religious revolution. That it will come sooner 
or later is as certain as that seed-sowing is succeeded by har- 
vest. Reforms no longer move with the snail's pace they did a 
century ago. This is an age of steam and electricity ; and every 
thing has to move with velocity. We cherish no unkindly feel- 
ings toward any church or people ; but we must rejoice that the 
strongholds of orthodoxy are being shaken, and error exposed, 
and that creeds are loosening their iron grasp upon the immor- 
tal mind. Old, long-cherished dogmas, myths, and blinding 
superstitions are passing away, to make room for something 
better. 



16 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Yes, the signs of the times indicate the dawning of a brighter 
day upon the world, — a day which shall be illuminated by the 
rays of reason and science. 

And, if this work shall contribute any thing toward speed- 
ing the dawning of that glorious era, we shall feel amply re- 
warded for the labor and personal sacrifice required in its pro- 
duction. . 

Reason will soon Triumph. 

The march of science and the rapid growth of the reasoning 
faculties peculiar to this progressive age are daily revealing the 
errors of our popular theology, and exposing their demoralizing 
effects in repressing the growth and healthy action of the intel- 
lect, and perverting the exercise of the moral faculties. And 
this progressive change and improvement must be a source of 
great rejoicing to every true-hearted philanthropist, and fur- 
nishes a strong incentive to labor with zeal in this field of re- 
form. It should be borne in mind, that all the dogmas and doc- 
trines of our current religious faith originated at a period before 
the sun of science had risen above the moral horizon, and ante- 
rior to the birth of moral science, and hence, like other produc- 
tions of that age, are heavily laden with error.. But rejoice, 
O ye lovers of and laborers for truth and science ! the dark 
clouds of our gloomy theology are rapidly receding before the 
sunlight of our modern civilization, and will soon leave a clear 
and cloudless sky ! And all will rejoice in having learned and 
practically experienced the glorious truth, that true religion 
is not incorporated in Bibles, or inscribed on the pages of any 
book, and cannot be found therein, but is a natural and sponta- 
neous outgrowth of man's moral and religious nature, and is 
"the most beautiful flower of the soul." 



APOLOGY AND EXPLANATION. 17 



CHAPTER II. 

APOLOGY AND EXPLANATION. 

Although books are constantly issuing from the press, and 
the country kept literally flooded with new publications, }^et but 
few of them meet the real wants of the age, and many of them 
are of no permanent practical benefit to the world. Such a work 
as is comprised in " The Bible of Bibles " is a desideratum. It 
has been long and loudly called for. It is a moral necessity, and 
partially supplies one of the great moral wants of the times. It 
is true, hundreds of works have been published embracing criti- 
cisms on the Bible, and attempting to expose some of its numer- 
ous errors, and portray some of its evil influences upon those 
who accept it as a moral guide. Yet it is believed that the 
present work embraces the first attempt to arrange together, or 
make out any thing like a full list of, the numerous errors of 
" the Holy Book." And yet it falls far short of accomplishing 
this end; for, although more than two thousand errors are 
brought to notice, a critical research would bring to light sev- 
eral thousand more. It will be observed by the reader, that there 
has been a constant effort on the part of the author to abridge, 
contract, and compress the contents of the volume into the 
smallest compass possible to be attained compatible with per- 
spicuity. Every chapter, and almost every line, discloses this 
policy. In no other way than by the adoption of such an expe- 
dient could two thousand biblical errors have been brought to 
notice in a single volume. The adoption of the most rigid rules 
of abbreviation and compression alone could have accomplished 
it ; and this polic}^ has been carried out even in making cita- 
tions from the Bible. Such superfluous words and phrases have 
been dropped as could be spared without impairing the sense or 



18 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

real meaning of the text. And yet, with this unceasing effort to 
compress and abridge the work, it falls so far short of portray- 
ing fulty all the errors and evils which a critical investigation 
shows to be the legitimate outgrowth of our Bible religion, that 
the author contemplates following it with another work, which 
ma}^ complete an exposition of nine thousand errors now known 
to be comprised in " the Holy Book." The title will probably 
be, " The Bible in the Light of History, Reason, and Science." 
He intends also to rewrite and republish soon, and probably 
enlarge, his " Biography of Satan," so as to make it entirely a 
new work. 

I. Jehovah. 

The author desires the reader to bear it specially in mind 
that his criticisms on the erroneous conceptions and representa- 
tions of God, as found in the Christian Bible, appertains in all 
cases to that mere imaginary being known as the Jewish Jeho- 
vah, and has no reference whatever to the God of the universe, 
who must be presumed to be a very different being. The God 
of Moses, who is represented as coming down from heaven, and 
walking and talking, eating and sleeping, traveling on foot 
(and barefoot, so as to make it necessary for Abraham to 
wash his feet) ; and who is also represented as eating barley- 
cakes and veal with Abraham (Gen. xviii.) ; wrestling all night 
with Jacob, and putting his thigh out of place ; trying to kill 
Moses in a hotel, but failing in the attempt ; and as getting van- 
quished in a battle with the Canaanites ; and also as frequently 
getting mad, cursing and swearing, &c, — such was the char- 
acter of Jehovah, the God of the Jews, — a mere figment of 
the imagination. Hence he is a just subject of criticism. 

II. Tin: Ivklationsiiip of the Old and New Testaments. 

Some of the representatives of the Christian faith, when the 
shocking immoralities of the Old Testament are pointed out, 
attempt to evade the responsibility by alleging that they do not 
live under the old dispensation, but the new, thereby intimat- 
ing thai they are not responsible lor the errors of the former. 
But the following considerations will show that such a defense 
is fallacious and entirely untenable : — 



APOLOGY AND EXPLANATION. 19 

1 . It takes both the Old and the New Testaments to consti- 
tute " the Holy Bible," which they accept as a whole. 

2. Both are bound together, and circulated by the million, as 
possessing equal credibility and equal authority. 

3. Both are quoted alike by clergymen and Christian writers. 

4. The New Testament is inseparably connected with the 
Old. 

5. The prophecies of the Old form the basis of the New. 

6. Both are canonized together under the word " holy." 

7. Nearly all the New-Testament writers, including Paul, 
indorse the Old Testament, and take no exception to any of 
its errors or any of its teachings. For these reasons, to accept 
one is to accept the other. Both stand or fall together. 

Note. — Christ modified some of Moses's errors, "but indorsed most of the Old Testa- 
ment errors. 



20 TME BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER in. 

WHY THIS WORK WAS WRITTEN. 

There are in this and other Christian countries more than 
one hundred thousand clergymen who spend a portion of each 
recurring sabbath in presenting the claims, and dilating upon 
the beauties and benefits (some real and some imaginary), of 
the religion of the Christian Bible. They claim that it is the 
religion for this age, and a religion that should be adopted by 
the whole human race ; but they present but one side of the 
picture, and but one phase of the argument. A witness before 
a jury is required to " tell the truth, and the whole truth ; " but 
the priesthood dare not do this with respect to the errors and 
defects of their religion. They would lose their congregations 
and their salaries also. But few clergymen possess the moral 
courage to turn state's evidence against their pockets or their 
u bread and butter." It is a sad reflection that they are hired, 
and required to conceal whatever errors may loom up before 
their moral vision in the investigation of the principles of their 
religion, or the Bible on which it is founded. They are placed 
in the position of an attorney who is sworn to be true to his 
client at any sacrifice of truth and moral manhood. Whatever 
may be their moral convictions with respect to the sinfulness or 
evil consequences or demoralizing effects of continuing to 
preach the intellectually dwarfing and morally poisoning doc- 
trines originated in, and adapted only to, the dark and undevel- 
oped ages of the past, when the race was under the dominion 
of the animal and blind propensities, yet they must do it. They 

must continue to preach these errors, to sustain these evils, and 

maintain their false positions, or lose their salaries and their 
popular standing in society. It is a vcr} T unfortunate position 



WHY THIS WORK WAS WRITTEN. 21 

to be placed in ; but, self-interest being the ruling principle of 
the age, we cannot reasonably expect the clergy will do any 
thing toward enlightening the people on the errors and immoral 
influences of their religious doctrines, or the substitution of a 
better system, until human nature has advanced to a higher 
moral plane. On the contrary, we must expect they will con- 
tinue to blind the people, pervert the truth, magnify every 
imaginable good quality of their religious system ; while, on the 
other hand, they will as sedulously attempt to hide every defect 
which either they or others may discover in their Bible. This 
state of things in the religious world imposes upon the moral 
reformer the solemn necessity of employing the most effectual 
lever, and of adopting every available moral means, to counter- 
act this morally deleterious influence of the clergy, and arrest 
the tide of evil which follows in their wake as the legitimate 
fruits of a course of conduct dictated by policy instead of prin- 
ciple. 

II. The Moral Truths of the Bible. 
Some of our readers will doubtless be disposed to ask why we 
have not occupied a larger portion of this work in exhibiting the 
beauties and benefits of the religion and system of morals set 
forth in thq^Bible. The answer to the question is full} 7 antici- 
pated in the preceding remarks. It is simply because fifty 
thousand tongues and pens are almost constantly employed in 
this work. The} 7 do it and overdo it. This renders it a work of 
supererogation on our part ; while, on the other hand, we find 
the errors and evils of the Bible and its religion, which they 
overlook or neglect to expose, so very numerous, that we can 
not exhibit them in a single volume, unless we allow but a lim- 
ited space to a repetition of what is done by them every week. 
This is our reason for appearing to pursue a one-sided policy. 

III. Why Resort to Ridicule? 
We hope we shall not be misunderstood or condemned by any 
reader for appearing to indulge frequently in a spirit of levity 
in attempting to expose the logical and moral absurdities of the 
Bible. We have assumed this license more from an appre- 
hended moral necessity than from a natural disposition. Ridi- 



22 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

cule is now generally acknowledged by moralists to be a most 
potent weapon for the demolition of error. Moral and religious 
absurdities, according to Cicero, can be arrested and put down 
much sooner by " holding them up to the light of ridicule, than 
by any other means that can be emphjyed." Let no one, then, 
oppose the use of such means simply because it ma}^ disturb a 
sensitive feeling in his own mind, derived from a false educa- 
tion. A critical investigation of religious history discloses the 
important fact, that the conviction established in the popular 
mind that it is wrong to indulge in a feeling of levity when 
writing or discoursing on religious subjects is the work of the 
clergy. Having discovered that many of the narrations of 
their Bible, and likewise many of the tenets of their creeds, are 
really ridiculous when examined in the light of science, reason, 
and sound sense, in order to prevent these ridiculous features 
of their systems from being exposed, they taught the people 
that ridicule is entirely out of place in matters of religion, and 
that such feelings, or language expressive of such feelings, 
should be entirely suppressed. And it is principally by the 
invention of this expedient, and the establishment of this con- 
viction in the public mind, that the clergy have succeeded in 
keeping the ridiculous errors of their creeds conceal% from age 
to age. And to continue this policy longer is only to yield to 
their interests, and prolong those evils still longer which have 
been perpetuated for centuries by the adoption of this expedi- 
ent. No other argument or apology is necessary than this as a 
justification of the limited extent to which the language of ridi- 
cule has been employed in this work. It is an egregious error, 
which is the offspring of an erroneous education and habit, to 
suppose that ridicule is more out of place on religious subjects 
than on other subjects. O. S. Fowler has fully established this 
as ;i scientific tact on phrenological grounds. We should be 
quite sorry to wound the feelings of any sensitive mind by any 

language made use of in this work, and hope this explanation 
will prevent such results, 

The Principal Design of Tins Work. 

A- :i critical exaniiiiat ion of the Christian Bible diseloses the 
fact that it contains several thousand moral and scientific 



WHY THIS WOBK, WAS WBITTEJST. 23 

errors, and as experience proves the tendency of such errors 
is to corrupt the moral feelings and check the intellectual 
growth of all who read and believe " the Holy Book," we have, 
since arriving at this conviction, considered it to be our duty 
not only to expose these errors, but also to discourage the 
habitual reading of the Bible with any other view than to learn 
its real character. And more especially do we earnestly advise 
parents not to place the Bible in the hands of their children till 
they arrive at an age when a more mature judgment can enable 
them to discriminate between its truths and its errors. And 
we likewise entreat all moralists and philanthropists, and all 
lovers of truth and virtue, as they desire the moral growth and 
moral reformation of the world, to exert their influence to stop 
the shipment of the Christian Bible to foreign lands to be cir- 
culated among the uncultured and credulous heathen. Here is 
disclosed one of our principal reasons for writing this work. 
We wish to make it a voice of remonstrance against placing 
any of those morally defective books called Bibles in the hands 
of the ignorant and impressible heathen, or the children of 
Christian countries, until their minds become sufficiently forti- 
fied by age and experience to resist or withstand the demoral- 
izing influe^pe of their bad precepts and bad examples as ex- 
posed in this work. 

Don't Read Pernicious Books. 
The Quaker Church /of which the author was once a mem- 
ber) have a clause in%heir discipline forbidding their members 
to read pernicious books, which are defined by one of the found- 
ers of the Church ( WiHiam Penn) to be " such books and pub- 
lications as contain language which appears to sanction crime or 
wrong practices, or teach bad morals." And hundreds of cases 
cited in this work prove that the Christian Bible may be ranked 
with works of this character. If the advice of the 'Hindoo 
editor had been complied with many years ago, — to u revise all 
Bibles, and leave out their bad precepts and examples," and 
change their obscene language, — the Christian Bible might now 
be a very useful and instructive book. But we are willing to 
leave it to the conscience of every honest reader, who places 



24 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

truth and morality above Bibles and creeds, to decide, after 
reading this work, whether the Bible, with all its ennobling pre- 
cepts, does not contain too strong an admixture of bad morality 
to make it a safe or suitable book to be relied on as a guide in 
morals and religion. According to Archbishop Tillotson, Bibles 
shape the morals and religion of the people in all religious coun- 
tries, — they are derived from the examples and precepts of 
these " Holy Books." If this be true, we most solemnly and 
seriously put the question to every Bible reader, What must be 
the effect upon the morals and religion of Christian countries of 
such moral examples as Abraham, Moses, Noah, Isaac, Jacob, 
David, Solomon, and nearly all the prophets, with their long 
string of crimes, as shown in this work? Let us not be guilty 
of the folty of suffering our inherited, stereotyped predilections, 
and exalted veneration for " the Holy Book," to rule our moral 
sense, and control our judgment in this matter, but muster the 
moral courage to look at the thing in its true light. Let us be 
independent moralists and philanthropists, rather than slaves to 
Bibles and creeds. " Every book," says a writer, " has a spirit 
which it breathes into the minds of its readers ; " and, if it con- 
tains bad morals or bad language, the habitual reading of it will 
gradually reconcile the mind to those immoral lessons, and 
finally cause them to be looked upon as God-given truths. Such 
is the omnipotent force of habit. And we appeal to all Bible 
lenders to testily if this has not been their experience. All 
Christian professors, when they first commenced reading the 
Bible, doubtless found many things in it which shocked their 
moral sense, did violence to their reasoning faculties, and morti- 
fied their love of decorum. But a perseverance in reading it, 
through the l'oree of habit and education, lias finally reconciled 
their minds to those immoral lessons, and blinded the judgment, 
so that they are not now COnscioua of their real character and 
deleterious influence upon the mind. 

Two Thousand Bible Ekkors. 
One of the strongest and most solemn lessons of human ex- 
perience, and proofs of the blinding effect of a false religious 

education, may be found in the fact that the two thousand Bible 



WHY THIS WORK WAS WRITTEN. 25 

errors brought to notice in this work have been overlooked from 
age to age by the great mass of Bible readers. So absolutely 
and deplorably blinded have they been in some cases, as to lead 
them to conclude, like Dr. Cheever of New York, that " the 
Bible does not contain the shadow of a shade of error from 
Genesis to Revelation." Such a perversion and stultification 
of the reasoning faculties was never excelled in any age or 
country. St. Augustine furnishes another striking illustration 
of the total wreck of mind and moral principle which an obsti- 
nate determination to accept the Bible with all its errors is 
capable of effecting. Having found a great many absurdities in 
the Bible which he could not reconcile with reason and sense, 
and hence discovering he must either give up his Bible or his 
reason, he chose the latter alternative, and declared in his 
" Book of Sermons " (p. 33), " I believe things in the Bible 
because they are absurd. I believe them because they are 
impossible " (as glaring an absurdity as ever issued from human 
lips) . Such a desperate expedient to save his Bible and creed 
from going overboard shows that they had demoralized his 
mind, and made a complete wreck of his reason. This is the 
writer who declared he found and preached to a nation of people 
who had but one eye, and that situated in their foreheads, and 
another nation who had no heads, but eyes in their breasts. It 
seems a pity that this single-eyed nation became extinct ; for 
Christ declared, " If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be 
full of light." Such an embodiment of light might have done 
much to enlighten the world. And this St. Augustine is the 
writer whom Eusebius pronounces u the great moral light of 
the Christian Church." And St. Irenaeus furnishes another 
deplorable example of the prostration or perversion of the moral 
faculties by accepting the Bible as a standard for morals when 
he justified the crime of incest by pointing to the example of 
"righteous Lot" and his daughters. The celebrated Albert 
Barnes was made a victim of great mental suffering for many 
years b} r his laborious but ineffectual attempts to reconcile the 
Bible with the dictates of reason. Hear what he says about the 
matter. We will present the case in his own language : ' ' These 
difficulties (of reconciling the teachings of the Bible to rea- 



26 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

son) are probably felt by every mind that ever reflects on the 
subject ; and they are unexplained, unmitigated, and unremoved. 
I confess, for one, that I feel them, and feel them more sensibly 
and powerfully the more I look at them, and the longer I live. 
I do not understand them, and I make no advance toward 
understanding them. I do not know that I have a ray of light 
upon this subject which I had not when the subject first flashed 
across my soul. I have read what wise and good men have 
written upon the subject ; I have looked at their theories and 
explanations ; I have endeavored to weigh their arguments, — 
for my whole soul pants for light and relief on these questions : 
but I get neither ; and, in the anguish and distress of my soul, I 
confess I get no light whatever. I see not one ra}^ to disclose 
to me the reason why sin came into the world, why the earth is 
strewn with the dying and the dead, and why man must surfer 
to all eternity. I have never seen a particle of light thrown on 
these subjects that has given a moment's ease to my tortured 
mind. ... I trust that other men . . . have not the anguish 
of spirit which I have. But I confess, when I look on a world 
of sinners and sufferers, upon death-beds and graveyards, and 
upon a world of woe filled with hosts to suffer for ever ; and when 
I see m}' friends, my parents, my family, my people, my fellow- 
citizens — when I look upon a whole race — all involved in this 
sin and danger ; and when I see the great mass of them wholly 
unconcerned ; and when I feel that God only can save them, and 
yet he docs not do it, — I am struck dumb. It is all dark — 
dark — dark to my soul ; and I cannot disguise it " (Practical 
Sermons, p. 121). There, reader, you have the candid confes- 
sion of :in honest-minded, orthodox, and one of the ablest and 
i talented writers that ever wielded the pen in defense of the 
( liristi:in faith. And if such a talented and logical mind could 
find no reason, consistency, or moral principle in the dogmas of 
orthodoxy, we may readily ask, Who can? Thousands of other 
orthodox clergymen have doubtless been perplexed with the same 
difficulties, but have not had the honesty to confess it. Those 
who do not now perceive them can find the reason by putting 
their hands on their Own heads. They will find their intellects or 
logical brains defective. .Moral philosophers now find no dhTi- 



WHY THIS WORK WAS WRITTEN. 27 

culty in solving any of those problems which so much perplexed 
the mind of Mr. Barnes. They are all false and unfounded dog- 
mas, except the prevalence of death and disease in the world. 
And these casualties are now known to be amongst the wisest 
and most useful dispensations of nature. (See chapter headed 
Natural and Moral Evil.) And had Mr. Barnes ascended to the 
plane of mental and moral science, instead of remaining down in 
tne dark, orthodox, theological cellar, trying to squeeze truth 
out of old, dead, dried-up, dusty, theological dogmas, he would 
have readily found the solution to all his problems, and would 
have rejoiced in thus emerging into the glorious sunlight of 
truth. 

Bibles Useful in their Place. 

We do not question but that Bibles served a useful purpose 
for those nations and tribes by whom and for whom they were 
written ; but as they only represent the imperfect moral and 
religious conceptions of that age, and have always been sacredly 
guarded from improvement, to make them the rule of action for 
any subsequent age would be tcr stop all moral and religious 
improvement. It is strikingly evident that society can make no 
improvement while it follows a Bible which is interdicted from 
improvement. It must remain stationary, with respect to reli- 
gion and morals, so far as it is tied to an unchangeable book. 
Bibles in this way become masters of human thought, and 
shackles for the soul, and thus inflict serious evils upon society by 
their tendency to stop all moral, and religious progress. Three 
thousand or ten thousand years may elapse, and no improve- 
ment can be made in the religion or morals of the people 
while the Bible from which they emanate is prohibited from 
improvement. Thus Bibles inflict a death-like torpor and stag- 
nation upon the moral and intellectual progress of society so 
far as their precepts are lived up to ; that is, so far as the 
assumption that there can be no improvement in the teachings 
of the Bible is practically observed. It is the source of a pleas- 
ing reflection, however, to know that most Bible believers habitu- 
ally violate their own principles by trampling this assumption 
under foot. Otherwise we would have remained eternally Jn a 
state of barbarism. 



28 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE BEAUTIES AND BENEFITS OP BIBLES. 

There is displayed in all Bibles a devout recognition of mora 
principles, and a strong manifestation of moral feeling. The 
disciples of all Bibles manifest an ardent aspiration for some- 
thing higher, something nobler, — a mental struggle to reach a 
higher plane. This moral aspiration is displayed in almost 
every chapter ; and there are in all Bibles veins of beautiful 
thought coursing through their pages. All of them contain 
moral precepts which are in their nature elevating and enno- 
bling, and which, if practically recognized, would have done 
much to improve the morals and enhance the happiness of their 
disciples ; and all Bibles are valuable as fragments of religious 
history, and as indicating the state of religion and morals of the 
people who originated them. Their numerous outbursts of 
religious feeling indicate the depth of their devotion ; while 
their many noble moral aphorisms indicate an appreciation of, 
and a desire for, a higher moral life than they were able to prac- 
tice because of the strength of their animal feelings. This is 
lecially true of the Jews, and also of the early Christians. 
They had a partial perception of a true moral life, and a desire 
at times to practice it ; but that desire was counteracted and 
held in check by their still stronger animal natures and animal 
propensities. 

A IIiom.K Plant. OF DEVELOPMENT has BEEN ATTAINED. 

There can be no question, from the light derived from the 

twofold avenues of science and history, hut that the great prin- 
ciple Of universal progress, which is carrying every thing for- 
ward to a higher plane and state of perfection, has elevated the 



THE BEAUTIES AND BENEFITS OF BIBLES. 29 

most advanced nations of the present age beyond and above the 
religion and morals prevalent in the world when the Jewish and 
Christian Bible was written, which makes it very unsuitable for 
the 'present advanced state of societ} 7 . An investigation of the 
science of anthropology discloses the very significant and impor- 
tant fact, that the religious feelings of the founders and early 
representatives of the Jewish and Christian religions were under 
the control of their animal natures, which accounts for their 
frequent use of obscene language, and their frequent indul- 
gence in the practice of every species of crime with the full 
sanction of the principles of their religion. And they cherished 
^the conviction that those things had the divine sanction. 
f 

Look at the Difference. 

The moral and religious feelings of the early Jews and Chris- 
tians co-operated with their animal propensities ; and the latter 
held supreme sway over the former : while the moral and reli- 
gious feelings of the most advanced minds of the present day 
co-operate, not with the animal, but with the intellectual. This 
makes a very important and very marked difference, and makes 
the semi-animal religion of the past very unsuitable for the pres- 
ent age. Please note this point, friendly reader. 

Bible Writers Honest. 

It may readily be conceded that the writers and compilers of 
all Bibles were honest, and that all the errors which those Bibles 
embrace, and the crimes which they sanction, were honestly 
believed to be right, and in accordance with the will of God. 
For all sacred history teaches us, as an important lesson of 
human nature, that no errors are too gross, no crimes too enor- 
mous, no statements too false or absurd, no contradictions too 
glaring, and no stories too preposterous or too ridiculous, to 
receive the fullest indorsement of the most honest and pious 
minds, and to be even cherished by them as God-given or 
divinely revealed truths, when such has been their teaching 
every day of their lives, in connection with the habitual sup- 
pression of the voice of reason, and the inherited conviction of 
their truth deeply implanted in the mind, derived from a thou- 



30 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

sand preceding generations. A strong and unyielding cord of 
religious conviction thus grows in the human mind, which no 
reason, no philosophy, and no science can ever sever or even 
shake. It becomes a moral canker, which no remecty can reach, 
or arrest in its progress. It seems to grow into the very heart- 
strings. Such is the strength of religious prejudice, such the 
weak side of human nature. Three hundred millions of people 
believe in the Hindoo religion, one hundred millions in the 
Chinese religion, two hundred millions in the Mahomedan reli- 
gion, and one hundred and fifty millions in the Christian re- 
ligion, — all for the same reasons, because their parents so 
believed, and taught them, and their neighbors still believe it ; 
and surrounding influences have caused them to continue in 
their erroneous belief. 

After the illuminating ra}^s of the sun of science had to some 
extent dispelled the religious errors of our early education, 
the case was so plain, that we entered upon the work of trying 
to convince others, with sanguine hopes of success. But expe- 
rience has established the conviction in our mind, that if every 
text of the Christian Bible were a falsehood, and every line of 
their creeds an absurdity, there are many devout admirers of 
the book who could never be made to see it, because they are 
ruled by their religious feelings, and not by their reasoning fac- 
ulties ; and hence they will live and die in their moral and 
religious errors. But we rejoice in the omnipotent power of 
truth, which will finally dispel all error from progressive minds. 

General Claims of Bibles. 

More than twenty sacred books have been 'found in various 
countries, which, if not in all cases denominated Bibles, have 
at least been venerated and used as such, and, properly speak- 
ing, are Bibles. Hence we shall call them Bibles. The list in 
this chapter comprises nearly all which recent research lias 
brought to light. A brief synopsis of the character and contents 
of each will be presented, so far as a comparative view with the 
Christian Bible seems to make it requisite. 

All of these Billies ] onie eoininon characteristics : — 

1. All of them were claimed to be inspired. 



THE BEAUTIES AND BENEFITS OF BIBLES. 31 

2. All were claimed to be an embodiment of wisdom and 
knowledge far transcending the ordinary attainments of man. 

3. All were penned by inspired men, who were shielded from 
the possibilit}^ of erring while writing them. 

4. Each Bible is a finality in religious knowledge. 

5. Each one is an authority from which there is no appeal. 

6. It is a sin to question or doubt the truth of any of them, 
or to suggest the possibility of their containing errors. 

7. Some of them were written by God, some by angels, and 
others by inspired men. 

8. Each one points out the only safe and certain road to 
heaven. 

9. He who is a disbeliever in any one of these holy books 
is an infidel. 

10. Each one is to effect the salvation of the whole human 
race. 



32 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER V. 

TWENTY-SEVEN BIBLES DESCRIBED. 

The Hindoo Bibles. — I. The Yedas. 

The Veda is considered to be the oldest sacred book of the 
Hindoos, and is evidently the oldest Bible now extant. There is 
a vast amount of evidence to prove that it was written long before 
the time of Moses, which establishes the fact that it borrowed 
nothing from the Jews or Jewish writings. They purport to be 
the inspired utterances of very ancient and hoty saints and 
prophets, known as Eishis, who received them directly from the 
mouth of the great God Brahma about nine thousand years ago, 
after the}^ had existed in his mind from all eternit}\ These 
" holy men," by their devout piety and unreserved devotion to 
the cause of God and religion, it was believed, had attained 
to true holiness and heavenly sanctity. The Yedas treat of the 
attributes of God, and his dealings with the human race; his 
invisibility and spirituality; his unchangeableness, omniscience, 
omnipotence, and omnipresence ; the nature and binding force 
of his laws ; the doctrine of future rewards and punishments ; 
frequent and wonderful display of divine power, called miracles, 
&c. It contains, likewise, many noble, lofty, and beautiful 
moral precepts. It also treats, to some extent, of astronomy, 
medicines, and government. The May number of " The New- 
York Tribune" for 1858 contains a very interesting account 
of the recent translation of the Vedas into the English Language, 
from which we will make a few extracts: "The whole of the 
Veda is now being published for the first time by the East- 
India Company, by which the reader will learn that most of the 
odious things which have been charged to it are false. They 
are not found therein. They are Christian forgeries; such as 



TWENTY-SEVEN BIBLES DESCRIBED. 33 

the burning of widows on the funeral pile of their husbands, the 
marriage of children, the doctrine of caste, &c. None of these 
things are taught or countenanced by the Vedas. The man who 
believes in the Yedas approximates to a Christian." (Mark 
this statement, Christian reader!) Mr. Greeley further says: 
" The highest authority for the religion of the Brahmins is the 
Vedas. The most elaborate arguments have been framed by 
its devout believers to establish its divine origin and absolute 
authority. They constantly appeal to its authority, and, in 
controversy with Mahomedan and Christian missionaries ' ' (Ma- 
homedans have missionaries among them, observe), " they 
invariably fall back on the Vedas, — referring to it with great 
confidence in support of any thing the} 7 wish to establish as di- 
vine. There is no doctrine of Christianity which has not been 
anticipated by the Vedas." What is that you say, Mr. Gree- 
ley? " They have all the doctrines of Christianit} 7 ! " Is that 
possible? All the holy and inspired doctrines of Jesus Christ, 
the great divine Lawgiver and Savior of the world, found in an 
old heathen Bible, written more than two thousand years before 
a single line of the doctrines of Christ was penned ! Here is one 
of the most astounding announcements ever made to the world. 
The reader, perhaps, will suppose that Mr. Greeley was an infi- 
del ; but here, again, is something most astonishing : Mr. Gree- 
ley was up to this time a sound member of a Christian church, 
and withal a truthful writer. Such an announcement ought to 
have startled the whole Christian world, and set them to inves- 
tigating the matter. But, like the disciples of all the heathen 
religions, they are immovably fixed in the errors of their faith, 
and turn a deaf ear to all criticism, and all honest inquiry relat- 
ing to the truth of its claims. Such is the tenacity of their 
inherited convictions of being right, their assumption of infalli- 
bility, their aversion and opposition to investigation, that, if 
every line of their Bible was a falsehood, but few of them would 
find it out. 

There are four works which come under the name of Vedas, 
known as the Rig Veda, Yojur Veda, Sama Veda, and Athar- 
va Veda. Each of these Bibles is constituted of various books, 
probably the work of different writers. Each Veda is accompa- 



34 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

nied by psalms or hymns, known as the " Sanhita," and also 
by a sort of prose treatise or commentary, called the " Brah- 
mana," which possesses a ritualistic or didactic character, — all 
of which were believed to be inspired. " Never has the theory 
of inspiration," sa}^s Mr. Amberly, " been pushed to such ex- 
tremes as in the case of the Vedas. They were believed by 
some to be the direct creation of Brahma," while the hymns 
which accompany them were claimed to be the inspired produc- 
tions of hoi} 7 men and prophets (Rishis) . The Vedas was the 
standard authority in all cases ; and any doctrine, opinion, or 
statement at variance with the Vedas was to be rejected as 
false. "And as for a contradiction in the Holy Book," says 
Mr. Amberly, " the thought was not to be entertained for a 
moment as possible." Such a conclusion they ascribed to the 
reader's wrong interpretation of its language. Such was the 
extreme veneration in which the book was held, that every text, 
word, and even syllable, was counted. A Brahmin was not al- 
lowed to marry till after he had devoted several years to study- 
ing the Holy Book ; And, to attain to complete holiness, the dis- 
ciple must commit the Rig Veda to memoiy, or read it through 
on his bended knees. The Vedas represent God as being " one 
and indivisible," and "merciful to sinners." And Brahmins 
and Budhists, when they pray for sinners or for their enemies, 
manifest a spirit of kindness and forgiveness not equalled by 
Christ inns. 

The Budhists had many churches and many priests, who 
taught the people to lead virtuous lives, and to avoid the com- 
mission of every species of crime, including the use of intoxi- 
cating drinks. And in no other system was ever benevolence and 
charity, and also chastity, more emphatically enjoined, or more 
consistently practiced. The Vedas teach that every good act 
1ms Its reward] and every bad act its punishment. Its disciples 
are taught thai many saviors (Budhas) have appeared on earth 
at different periods to suffer and die for the people; the la it of 
which was Guatama, eotemporary with Christ. lie is an object 
of great veneration amongst them, and prayers are often ad- 
dressed to him. Many tales are told of his goodness, sell- 
denial, suffering, and sacrifice for the people, which leads to the 



TWENTY-SEVEN BIBLES BESCBIBEB. 35 

conclusion that he was a pure, holy, and unselfish being. He 
gave utterance to many noble and morally exalting precepts. 
His principal precepts were comprised in six commandments : 
1. " Not to kill any living creature." 2. " Not to steal." 3. 
" Not to commit unchastity." 4. " Not to lie." 5. " Not to 
drink intoxicating drinks." 6. u Not to lay up treasures upon 
earth." These are a few of his leading precepts, and which he 
himself practiced. In the observance of the last precept, he 
and his followers have excelled almost every Christian on earth, 
as their Bible contains the same precept, but none of them try to 
practice it. Hence the Hindoos are in this respect much better 
Christians than the Christians themselves. Here it may be 
noted that the Hindoos, like the disciples of the Christian faith, 
have had various ecclesiastical councils to settle the canon of 
their Bible or some controverted doctrinal questions. One of the 
most noted of these councils was called under the reign of 
King Asoka in the year 246 B.C. It was constituted of seven 
hundred u learned and accomplished priests." But they could 
not stop the progress of infidelity, as they essayed to do. It con- 
tinued to increase till another council was called under the reign 
of King Kanishka, and another revision of the sacred text took 
place. But, as in Christian and Mahomedan countries, it tended 
rather to unsettle than to settle the popular faith. Nothing can 
arrest the intelligence and growth of progressive minds. Skep- 
ticism and infidelity will continue to increase whenever the mind 
is unfettered by priestcraft, till the last credal institution is 
swept from the face of the earth, and ceases to curse the human 
family. 

II. The Institutes of Menu. 

u The Code of Menu," or " Institutes of Menu," constitutes 
another sacred book of the Hindoos. The Rev. Mr. Allen says 
of it : u It is a code of religious and civil laws, and makes a 
part of the Hindoo Scriptures." It is in many respects simi- 
lar to the Yedas, and is almost equal to it in age ; and, like 
the Veclas, it is a standard of faith and a guide for moral action. 
Hindoos call it Menu Darma Shastra, " the ordinances of God." 
" As these ordinances, or divine laws," says Mr. Allen, " pro- 
fess to be of divine origin, kings have no authority to change 



36 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

them. Their duty was to administer their governments accord- 
ing to their teachings." All classes of people were required to 
live up to them. " In these respects," says Mr. Allen (p. 
36G), " they resemble the laws given b}^ Moses, and contained 
in the Old Testament." These Institutes treat on the subject 
of creation, the doctrine of future rewards and punishments, 
and also define many of the duties of life. 

III. Ramayana. 

With respect to age, the Ramayana is generally ranked next 
to the Code of Menu, and is equally adored as a holy and in- 
spired book, and " maybe classed," says Mr. Allen, " with the 
Hindoo Scriptures." It treats of the war in Heaven, in which 
the dragon, or serpent-devil, was cast to the earth. To put an 
end to his ravages here, the Savior and incarnate God Chrishna 
was sent down. Christ, we are told, " came to destroy the devil 
and his works." Col. Sherman tells us, in his ' c Recollections 
of an Indian Official," that " the people (Hindoos) assured us 
this Bible was written, if not b}^ the hand of the Deity himself, 
at least by his inspiration ; and, if asked if any absurdity that 
may be pointed out in the book be true, they repty with great 
na'.vete, c Is it not written in the Holy Book? and how could it 
be there, and not be true? ' " — exactly the same defense that is 
often set up for the Christian Bible b} T its educationally warped 
admirers. It is believed the great Hindoo prophet, Vyas, wrote 
much of this Bible, or " Inspired Poem," as some call it. 

IV. The Maiiabarat. 

The origin of this sacred book is considered to be very nearly 
co-equal with that of the Ramayana. It has an appendix, or 
epistle, called the ;t Bagka/vat Gita," which, on account of its 
high tone of spirituality, has attracted much attention in Europe. 
The Hindoos believe the Mahabrat is highly inspired, and that 
every event noticed in it was recorded before it took place ; thus 
making il in the highest degree prophetic. "Its author, they 
claim. " Bays Mr. Allen, "is no oilier than the incarnate God 
Chrishna, of whose life it treats." That profound Oriental 
Bcholar, Mr. Wilkins, thinks this and the other sacred books of 



TWENTY-SEVEN BIBLES DESCRIBED. 37 

India are more than three thousand years old, as is evidenced 
by sculptures in solid rocks. 

Y. The Purans, or Poranas. 
The Hindoo Holy Scriptures, when arranged together in one 
book, are known as the Barta Shastra, of which the Poranas 
constitute a part. The last-named work treats of the creation 
of the world, and its final destruction and future renovation, 
the " great day of judgment, " Divine Providence, &c. ; also 
the ordinances and rules for worship, &c. 

VI. Analogies of the Brahmin and Jewish Religion. 

Brahminism and Judaism are each old forms of religion. 
Each was superseded by a new and improved form of religion. 
Each has a story of creation. Jehovah and Brahma both cre- 
ated the sun, moon, and stars (so believed by millions) . 

1. The spirit of both moved upon the face of the waters. 

2. The world is spoken in to existence by both Jehovah and 
Brahma. 

3. The Hindoos had an Adimo and Iva, the Hebrews an Adam 
and Eve. 

4. In each case every thing is to produce after its kind. 

5. Man is in each case the last and crowning work of the 
whole creation. 

6. Both stories set man as a ruler over subordinate creation. 

7. Light in each case was spoken into existence. 

8. Jehovah and Brahma each occupied six clays in the work 
of creation. 

9. There is a primitive paradise and state of moral purity in 
each story. 

10. A tree whose fruit produced immortality is noticed in each 
cosmogony. 

11. A serpent figures in each, and outwits Brahma and Jeho- 
vah. 

12. Man in each partakes of the fruit of the tree of knowledge. 

13. The doctrine of the fall is found in each account. The 
means for man's restoration is provided in each case. 

14. Each sacred legend has a story of a war in heavea. 



38 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

15. The soul is the breath of life, or breath of God, in each 
cosmogony. 

16. Labor is imposed as a curse in each case. 

17. A moral code of ten commandments is found in each sys- 
tem. Not to kill is the first command in each decalogue. Steal- 
ing is interdicted in each decalogue. Adultery is condemned in 
each. Bearing false witness is forbidden by each. 

18. Both Brahmins and Jews lost their " Holy Law," or 
" Laws of God." One had a Hilkiah, and the other a Bishen, 
to find the law. 

19. Each had an established order of priesthood. The priest- 
hood was hereditary in eaoh case : a tribe or family furnished 
the priests in each case. 

20. Both claimed to be God's pet and holy, or peculiar, 
people ; and both stjled other nations barbarians or aliens. 

21. Both holy nations were forbidden to marry with others; 
and both were too holy to eat with barbarians. 

22. Eacli had a ceremonial law prescribing numerous rites. 
The church ceremonies were performed by priests in each. 

23. The priests were forbidden to eat meat in both cases. 

24. Both Jews and Brahmins worshiped by bloody sacrifices. 
Both had their favorite sacred animals. Animal sacrifices were 
by each to arrest public calamities. 

25. One interdicted beef, and the other pork, as food. 

20. Both prescribed purification after touching dead bodies; 
and each religion had a law of purification. Bathing was a 
mode of purification in each religion. 

27. Each has its "holy " places, times, days, cities, moun- 
tains, rivers, &C. India, as well as Judea, was considered a 
holy land. 

28. Bach had its holy ground. Both drew oil' their shoes on 
entering upon hoi}- ground or holy places. 

29. Both had their holy days, and the same in most 
cas< 

30. Mount filera was no less holy than Mount Sinai or Mount 
Horeb. Jordan was a sacred river in one ease, and Ganges 
in the other. Jerusalem was a " holy " city with the Jews, and 

lares with the Hindoos. 



TWENTY-SEVEN BIBLES DESCBIBED. 39 

31. Holy fasts and feasts were a part of each religion. Both 
made a holy feast at full moon. 

32. Each had its holy fires. 

33. Both had their holy mysteries kept sacredly guarded. 

34. Each prepared and kept holy water for ceremonial 
purposes. 

35. Both anointed themselves with " holy ointment." 

36. Each claimed to have the only true and " holy faith." 

37. "Holy temples" were familiar terms to each. Their 
temples were constructed in a similar manner. Each had a 
"sanctum sanctorum," or "holy of holies." Only the holy 
priest of both entered the interior sanctum. 

38. Both had their drink-offerings (called turpin by the Hin- 
doos) . 

39. Both sprinkled their door-posts with blood. 

40. One had a scape-goat, and the other a scape-horse. 

41. Both taught that the sins of the father were visited upon 
the children. 

42. Religious pilgrimages were practiced by each. 

43. Both acknowledge and teach one supreme God. Inferior 
deities, or angels, are believed in by each. God's omniscience, 
omnipotence, and omnipresence are taught in both Bibles. 

44. God is represented to be invisible by each. And "God 
is a spirit," and infinitely wise and good, is taught in each. 

45. To love God supremely is recommended by each. 

46. Both taught that God was a God of power, and assisted 
them in their battles. 

47. Both taught that a knowledge of God is essential. 

48. Silent meditation upon the Lord is recommended by 
each. 

49. God was to each a refuge in danger and trouble. 

50. The government of each was a theocracy, God the 
executive. 

51. Both religions were constituted largely of external rites. 
In each the priest was the expounder of the holy books and laws. 
"Patriarchs" was one of the sacred orders of each system. 
Holy "prophets" figure conspicuously in each system. Both 
priests and people were in each case believed to be inspired. 



40 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

52. And each had its witnesses to prove the truth and fulfill- 
ment of its prophecies. 

53. Both held their Holy Bibles as an inspired guide of right 
and wrong. 

54. One Bible was from Jehovah, and the other from Brahma. 

55. Ezra was inspired to compile the Jewish Bible, and Vyas 
the Brahmin. 

56. Each religious order had a holy ark containing something 
sacred. 

57. A story of a deluge is found in the Bible of each. 

58. The corruption or wickedness of society caused the flood 
in each case. 

59. The Brahmins had their patriarch Satyavrata, answering 
to Noah. 

$ 60. Each was forewarned of the flood. 

61. Eight persons were saved in each case. 

62. In each story a large vessel is prepared. Animals were 
saved by pairs in each case. A rainbow is spoken of in each 
flood story. 

63. For Shem, Ham, and Japhet, the Hindoos have a Sherma, 
Charma, and Jyapheta. 

64. Charma was condemned to be " a servant of servants/' 
• like Ham. 

G~). Human life was in each traditionally spun out to nearly 
a thousand years. 

G6. One day a thousand years with God, in each system. 
• 67. Both have stories of persons ascending to heaven. 

68. Budha was cast into tbe fiery furnace like the three holy 
children. 

69. Musavod was a giant in strength like Samson. 

70. Rhambha was changed to a pillar of stone, like Lot's 
wife to suit. 

71 . Mahendra was carried through the air like Habakkuk. 

72. A story of Budha answers to that of Daniel in the lions' 
den. 

73. Idolatry is discouraged, but occasionally practiced I)}' each. 
71. Witchcraft was believed in by each. 

1~). Here are presented sixty-eight striking analogies. 



TWENTY-SEVEN BIBLES DESCRIBED. 41 

VII. Antiquity of India. 

Haying presented a long list of analogies between the Hindoo 
and Jewish religions, we will proceed to prove the prior exist- 
ance of the Hindoo system, and leave the reader to deduce his 
own inferences. u In times coeval with the earliest authentic 
records," says a writer, " the Hindoos calculated eclipses, and 
were venerated for their attainments in some of the arts and 
sciences." According to the learned astronomer Baily, their 
calculations in astronomy extended back to the remote period 
of seventeen hundred years before Moses ; and some of the 
ancient monuments and inscriptions of India bespeak for its 
religion a very remote antiquity. Some of our modern learned 
antiquarians have expressed the opinion that the Sanscrit lan- 
guage of the Brahmins is the oldest language that can be traced 
in the history of the human race. They also state that this lan- 
guage was extant before the Jews were known as a nation ; and 
neither it nor their religion has ever been known to change. 
These facts are sufficient to establish the existence of the Brah- 
min and Budhist systems of religion long prior to the earliest 
records of the Jewish nation. 

Note. — Here we desire to call the attention of the reader to the very 
remarkable statement of Col. Dow in his " History of India." He tells 
us that "the Hindoos give a very particular account of the origin of the 
Jewish religion " (pref. v.). They say that a pious Hindoo by the name 
of Rajah Tura apostatized from the faith, for which he was banished to 
the West, where he established a system of religion, which became after- 
wards known as the Jewish religion. Tura only needs a change of one 
letter to make Tera, the father of Abraham. Let the reader make a note 
of this. 



42 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE EGYPTIAN BIBLE. 

The "Hermas." 
The sacred books, the " Hermas," or "Books of Hermas," 
were believed by the Egyptians to have been dictated by the 
God Isis, and inspired by him. In their collected capacity 
they constituted the Egyptian Bible, and were believed to con- 
tain u the sum total of human and divine wisdom." Their 
great age is undisputed. They treat of the creation of the 
world, the attributes of God, and the thcogony of the inferior 
deities, which answer to angels in the Christian system, as 
the} T hold the same office, and are apparently the same kind of 
beings. The "Hermas," like all other Bibles, recognize but 
one supreme God, whom it declares to be just, holy, morally 
perfect, invisible, and indivisible, and whom it recommends to 
be worshiped in silence. This "Holy Book" contains some 
lofty and soul-inspiring moral sentiments and useful precepts. 

Analogy of the Egyptian and Jewish Religions. 
Modern archaeological researches in Egypt have disclosed a 
very striking resemblance between the ancient Egyptian religion 
and that found in the Jewish Old Testament, which, with the 
evidence of the greater antiquity of the former, has fastened the 
conviction upon the mind of every impartial reader of history, 
thai the Jewish religion was constructed from materials obtained 
in Egypl and India ; and this conclusion is corroborated b}' 
the Bible itself, which tells us Moses was skilled in all the 
wisdom and learning of Egypt, and was by birth an Egyptian. 
When we compare the doctrines, precepts, laws, and customs of 
the two religions, we find but little difference between them. 



THE EGYPTIAN BIBLE. 43 

Even to the ten commandments there is a striking resemblance. 
The account of the creation and the order of its development 
is essentially the same in both. 1. The Egyptians had a 
leader filling the place of Moses by the name of Hermes ; and 
his writings were held in similar estimation, as they were be- 
lieved to be inspired and dictated by Infinite Wisdom. 2. The 
Egyptians had a priesthood of wealth and power, and possess- 
ing the same sacerdotal caste as those of the Jews. 3. And 
the priesthood, Mr. Pritchard tells us (Debate 116), was heredi- 
tary, and confined to a certain tribe, as was that of the Jews. 
According to Diodorus Siculus, and also Mr. Wilkinson, nearly 
all their ceremonies were essentially the same. 4. And their 
religious temples were constructed upon the same model, with an 
outer court and an inner court, — & sanctum sanctorum. 5. The 
Egyptians had numerous prophets like the Jews. And Herod- 
otus says, "The art of predicting future events came from the 
Eg} T ptians." 6. The Egyptians had an ark, or shrine, which 
served as an oracle, and was carried about on a pole by a pro- 
cession of priests, as the ark of the covenant of the Jews was 
by the Levites. The Kev. John Kendrick, in his "Ancient 
Egypt," acknowledged that he believed " the ark of the cov- 
enant of the Hebrews was constructed on the model of the 
Eg} T ptian shrine." 7. Kitto, in his "Cyclopedia," says the 
Egyptian sphinxes explain what is meant by the cherubims of 
the Jews. 8. In their selection of animals for sacrifices, we find 
the same rules were adopted. Each were controlled by. the singu- 
lar fancy of choosing a red heifer. 9. Each had their scape- 
animals to carry away their sins, — the Egyptians an ox, and the 
Jews a goat. 10. Both practiced circumcision. And we have 
the authority of Herodotus for saying the Jews and Phoenicians 
borrowed the custom of the Egyptians. 11. Both Jews and 
Egyptians took off their shoes when approaching a holy place, 
which, with the Egyptians, was in the temple. 12. Both believed 
in one supreme, over-ruling God, and many subordinates, known 
either as angels or deities, which, in their character and their 
offices, were essentially the same. And a hundred other analo- 
gies might be pointed out, which indicate the Oriental origin of 
Judaism. 



U THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Antiquity of Egypt. 
As a full comparison will show that the religion of ancient 
Egypt an( l tna t °f the Jews were essentially alike, not only in 
their general features but in their most minute details, with 
respect to most of their doctrines, precepts, and customs, the 
question arises, How came this resemblance? It is out of the 
question to consider it merely fortuitous : that one grew out of 
the other, or both were derived from a common source, we are 
compelled to admit. To determine which was the parent sys- 
tem we have only to ascertain which possesses the greater an- 
tiquity. This question is very easily settled. A large volume 
of facts is at our command which tend to prove that the Egyp- 
tians were in a high state of civilization before the Jews were / 
known to histoiy. The Bible itself partially recognizes this ^ 
fact by its frequent allusion to Egypt as a wise and powerful 
nation, able at all times to exercise superior sway over the Jews, 
and whose wise men, or magicians, could compete with not only 
the Jews, but their God, in the performance of miracles ; that 
is, with the Jews and their God to help them, in achieving the 
most astounding feats. They could make any thing that Jeho- 
vah could, with the exception of lice. The remote antiquity of 
Egypt can be proved by a few facts. The Egyptians have a 
carefully preserved list of sixty-one kings, who ruled the empire 
between Menes and Amasis, with names and ages given, whose 
aggregate reign comprises a period of more than seven thousand 
years. Herodotus says they computed with great care and accu- 
racy. Manetho tells us Menes reigned seven thousand seven 
hundred years ago, which places him more than seventeen 
lmi id ret I years before Adam. Engravings on monuments, 
and writings on papyrus, confirm the statement of Manetho. 
/jVnd then hieroglyphics on the pyramids of Egypt, with names, 
dates. and figures which have recently been deciphered, enable 
us io trace the antiquity of Egypt back eight thousand yearn, 
when/she is shown to have been in a high stale of civilization.*) 
Another fad : Layard and Rawlinson, who recently visited Egypt 
oners or agents of the British Government, state that 
f pottery have been recently found by digging in the 
Valley of the Nile, which, by counting the successive layers, or 



THE EGYPTIAN BIBLE. 45 

deposits, made b the annual overflowing of the river, are shown 
to be not less than eleven thousand years old. Such facts 
amount to demonstration, and can not be set aside. And Mr. 
Wilkinson, in his " Manners and Customs of Ancient Egypt," 
adduces another kind of evidence to show the impossibility of 
Egypt having obtained her religion from the Jews. /lie says, 
u The first glimpse we ob^iin of Egypt shows us a nation far 
advanced in the arts and customs and institutions of civilized 
life." ftAnd this was six or seven thousand }^ears ago; while 
the most conclusive evidence can be adduced to show T that no 
essential change has been made in her religion since the inscrip- 
tions were made on the monuments, some of which bear evi- 
dence of being eight thousand or nine thousand years old?\ If 
there has been no essential change in her religion for eight thou- 
sand or nine thousand years, it is prima facie evidence that she 
did not borrow any of her religious tenets of the Jews. Such 
facts settle the question more conclusively than the most elabo- 
rate argument could do, ' 



46 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER VII. 

TIE PEESIAN BIBLES. 

I. The Zend a Avesta. 

The Persians, properly speaking, had two Bibles, or Testa- 
ments, regarded as inspired and of divine authority, — the 
Zenda Avesta and the Sadder, which may be denominated their 
Old and New Testaments. With these may be classed other 
sacred books of Persia, known as the " Desatur" (or Revealed 
Will of God), the " G. Javidan" (or Eternal Wisdom), and 
the " Sojrfii Ibraham" (Wisdom of Ibraham). Hyde, in his 
Biography of Brittain, eighth chapter, pronounces the G. Javi- 
dan older than the writings of Zoroaster, which were penned 
600 B.C. 

The Zenda Avesta presents a detailed account of creation in 
six kappas^ or indefinite periods of time ; the temptation and 
fall of man, and his final restoration ; the immortality of the 
soul, &c. 

II. Persian Bible — The Sadder. 

The Sadder depicts cc the war in heaven/' in which the great 
dragon, or devil, Ahrimancs, is finally slain. This sacred book, 
as well as the Zenda Avesta, contains many beautiful precepts. 
The Persian sacred writings are all full of prayer and praise to 
God. One portion addresses him as Ormuzd, another as Ahura 
Mazda. None of their Holy Books countenance or show any 
favor either for idolatry or polytheism. The Persians have 
always opposed the making and worship of deific images ; and 
they worship bul one God, with the above names. One of their 

pr:r peeimen, will show this: k *() Ahnra Mazda, 

thou true and happy being! aid us to think and speak of thee, 



THE PERSIAN BIBLES. '4,1 

and do only those things which promote the true welfare of 
body and soul. I believe in thee as the just and holy God, thou 
living Wise One ! Thou art the author of creation, the true 
source of light and life. I will praise thee, thou Holy Spirit, 
thou glorious God Mazda ! Thou givest with a liberal hand 
good things to the impious, as well as to the pious." In that 
portion of the Zenda Avesta called the " Yacna," constituting 
seven chapters, it is declared, "We worship Ahura Mazda, and 
pray for the spread of his religion. We praise Mazda's reli- 
gion, and the pure brotherhood which it established. From the 
Holy Spirit Mazda proceeds all good, and he is the source of 
perfection and immortality." Here let it be noted that Cyrus 
of Persia was teaching the doctrine of immortality of the soul, 
while Moses seems never to have thought of such a thing : he 
is silent on the subject. Zenda Avesta means " The Living 
Word of God." It has also been called by its disciples 
" The Eevealed Word ;" and Ahura Mazda has been called the 
" God of gods," as the Jews called Jehovah. Who is to settle 
this counter-claim? 

Sin, repentance, and forgiveness are all recognized in the 
sacred books of the Persians. This is evinced by a devout dis- 
ciple, when he says, in praj^er, "I repent, O Lord, of my 
wicked deeds in thought and words. Forgive, O Lord: I 
repent of my sins." A writer says, " Upon the really fun- 
damental duties of man, the Zenda Avesta upholds a high 
standard of morality and honesty, and seeks to inculcate the im- 
mense importance of leading an upright and virtuous life, — such 
a life alone as can be pleasing to God and useful to man." A 
text in this sacred book reads, " You can not be a worshiper of 
the one true God and of many gods at the same time ; " which 
is a very explicit avowal of the belief in but one God. This 
Persian Bible declares, that one way to advance God's kingdom 
on earth is to confer benefit upon the poor. Its spirit of kind- 
ness and S3'mpathetic regard. for suffering extends even to the 
brute creation. It forbids cruelty to any class of beings, and 
enjoins kindness to all. Its psalms, hymns, and liturgies 
breathe forth a spirit of deep piety. A compliance with the 
divine law is urged as a means of saving the sinner from future 



48 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

punishment. The stern moral fortitude of the great teacher 
and moral exemplar Zoroaster, in resisting, like Christ, the 
temptations of the Evil One, evinces a high appreciation of true 
virtue. As a whole, the sacred books of the Persians, like 
those of other nations, contain a considerable amount of golden 
truth mixed with much rubbish and superstition. 

Analogy of the Persian and Jewish Religions. 

Doctor Pocoke says, "Many things taught in the sacred 
books of the Persians are the same as those taught in the Penta- 
teuch of Moses, and other parts of the Bible. They also con- 
tain many of the psalms erroneously called by the Jews and 
Christians the Psalms of David." Sir William Jones, in his 
"Asiatic Researches," says, "The primeval religion of Iran 
(Persia) is called b}^ Newton the oldest, and it ma}' justly be 
called the noblest, of all religions." It teaches " a firm belief 
that one supreme God made the world by his power, and governs 
it by his providence. It inculcates a pious fear, love, and adora- 
tion for God ; also a due reverence for parents and aged persons, 
fraternal affection for the whole human species, and a compas- 
sionate tenderness even for the brute creation." Can as much 
as this be said of the Christian religion ? Mr. Goodrich, after 
stating that the ancient Hebrews evidently had no idea of 
astronomy as a science, says, "The Chaldeans appear to have 
made observations on eclipses earlier than the commencement 
of written history " (" History of All Nations," p. 25). 

The Chaldeans and Persians have a story of creation essen- 
tially the same as that of the Jews. It represents Ormuzd as 
creating the world through the word in six kappas, or periods of 
time. Previous to that period, nothing but chaos, or darkness, 
and water had existed. Ormuzd created, first, the heavens and 
the earth ; second, the firmament ; third, the seas and waters; 
fourth, the sun, moon, and stars; fifth, birds, reptiles, quadru- 
peds. &C. : sixth, man. The Persians and Chaldeans have 4 also 

tory of a deluge, in which Xisuthra, being warned in a dream, 

built an ark, in which he saved himself, his wife and daughter, 
and the pilot, and a pair of every species of animals, reptiles, 
and birds. After the rain had ceased, he sent out a pigeon, 



THE PERSIAN BIBLES. 49 

which, finding no resting place, came back to the ark. The 
second time, it came with mud in its bill, which was a better evi- 
dence that the waters had subsided than the leaf which Noah's 
dove returned with, as that might have been picked up while 
floating on the waters. The} r had a giant in strength (a Gaza) 
answering to that of Samson. They had a story of a lofty 
tower designed to reach to heaven, but the gods destroyed it, 
and confounded the language of the builders. The Persians 
had their priests, their prophets, their angels, their twelve patri- 
archs, their holy fires, holy water, and rites of purification, like 
the Jews ; also their ordinance of water-baptism. Their holy 
mountains, hoi} 7 rivers, and holy waters, their animal sacrifices, 
and their sacrament or ceremony of bread and wine, were all similar 
to those of the Jews. They had a Soleimon and a Soleimon's tem- 
ple. Their religion was a theocracy, and was violently opposed 
to idolatrj^ ; but, unlike the Jewish religion, it taught the doctrine 
of the immortality of the soul, and the lofty idea that the human 
mind is an emanation from the divine nature. We find the 
principal elements of the Christian system also mixed up with 
the doctrines and principles above, set forth ; such as two primary 
principles of good and evil (Ormuzd and Ahrimanes) , termed 
by Christians God and the Devil, —two Gods with their two 
kingdoms, which were always at war with each other, to mode- 
rate which stands Mithra the Mediator, who was born, like 
Christ, of an immaculate virgin. For a further elucidation, see 
" The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors." 

Antiquity of the Persian Keligion. 
The historical facts to establish the existence of the Persian 
religion long prior to that of the Jews are numerous, cogent, 
and unanswerable. ^They have calculations in astronomy which, 
scientists admit, must have been made four hundred years an- 
terior to the time of Moses. (According to Berosus, fragments 
of their history have been found which extend it back fifteen 
thousand years ; and he tells us it is computed with great care.\ 



50 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

CHINESE BIBLES. 

Kings and Shoo. 

The Chinese have various sacred books, the principal of 
which are the Five Kings. They have also four Holy Books, 
known as Shoo, and one called Tao-te, though the word 
King is a term applied to all their sacred books. Some of these 
Holy Bibles are attributed to Confucius, one of them (Ta-heo, 
the Great Learning) to his grandson, and others to his dis- 
ciples. Some of the sects recognize thirteen Kings, or sacred 
books, others only seven, and the principal sect but five. 
Some of these Holy Books bear a resemblance to the Christian 
Gospels, others to the Epistles ; and one of them bears a con- 
siderable resemblance to Paul's Epistle to the Hebrews. They 
are believed to be divinely inspired ; and all are regarded as 
authority in matters of faith, doctrine, and practice. All of 
them inculcate virtue, and condemn vice and immoralit} T . I will 
present merely a brief exposition of a few of the leading books. 

I. Ta-IIeo ; or, Great Learning. 
This book forms the basis of the religious sect known as the 
Tao-ists. It treats principally of doctrines, but enjoins many 
important duties, — such as family government, the cultivation 
of the natural faculties, the acquisition of knowledge, the duty 
of being lionesi and sincere and rectifying the heart, and the 
moral obligation of having good rulers and a righteous govern- 
ment as means of making all peaceful and happy. 

II. Tin. Chung Yung; ok. The Doctrine of the Mean. 
This i.ook contains the Golden Bole: "What you do not 

like others to do to you, do not so to them.' ' It recommends a 



CHINESE BIBLES. 5 J 

state of harmony in the mental faculties as the path of duty 
and the road to happiness and to heaven. It teaches that peo- 
ple should follow the dictates of their own consciences, and 
cultivate and fully develop their natures. On the whole, it 
admonishes a sj^stem of moral perfection. It declares that 
spiritual beings are constantly around us, and we do nothing 
without them, though we do not see nor hear them. Pretty 
good spiritualism ! 

III. The Book of Mang, or Mencius. 

Mang, or Mencius, the philosopher, lived about two hundred 
years after Confucius. This Holy Book of his was not admitted 
into the Chinese canon till several centuries after it was 
written. Up to that date it was regarded as apocryphal, but 
is now held in high veneration as an inspired book. It affirms 
the essential goodness of human nature, instead of the Chris- 
tian doctrine of " total depravity." It teaches that all men 
are possessed of more or less goodness by nature, but are often 
corrupted by bad example and bad governments. It argues the 
moral right of the people to choose their own rulers. 

IV. Shoo King ; or, Book of History. 

This work is constituted of fifty-eight books. It throws 
much light on the history of the Chinese Empire, and bears 
evidence of having been written in a very remote age, but was 
compiled about 500 B.C. It argues that people are not bad 
by nature, and that it is the duty of governments to bless the 
good and punish the wicked. Otherwise they need not expect 
the blessing of heaven, or the favor of the people. It relates 
the case of an emperor who was reformed by reading the Holy 
Book. 

V. The She King ; or, Book of Poetry. 

This book is about as devoid of moral instruction as the 
Books of Ruth and Esther in the Christian Bible. It is princi- 
pally a display of human emotions and social feelings. Yet 
almost every Chinese has committed portions of it to memory. 
Being gotten up in the style of a poem, it is well calculated to 
enlist the feelings of the devout disciple. 



52 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

VI. The Chun Tsen ; or, Spring and Summer. 

This is principally a historical record, and is interpreted as 
representing spring and summer. It is held in high estimation 
as being the production of the "Great Divine Man," Confu- 
cius ; and it is wonderful with what ingenuity its commentators 
and teachers have succeeded in extracting from its dry details 
about wars, marriages, deaths, travels, eclipses, battles, &c, 
the most profound lessons in morals. Like the admirers and 
expounders of other Holy Books in all ages and countries, they 
bestow the most recondite spiritual meanings on texts contain- 
ing nothing but nonsense, senseless verbiage, or immoral teach- 
ings. 

VII. The Tao-te King ; or, Doctrine of Reason. 
" Tao " means absolute, and " Te " means virtue; which in- 
dicates that it teaches absolute virtue. Of all sacred books 
this is the most philosophical. It seems to constitute both a 
revelation and system of philosophy. It displays considerable 
wisdom and beauty, but is not free from those gross and repul- 
sive elements which characterize the Christian and some other 
Bibles. It declares that God created, cherishes, and loves all 
the world. It has no angry God, but one enjoining love and 
benevolence, and the return of good for evil, upon all the hu- 
man race. It declares God made all beings : his essence formed 
them, his might preserves them, his providence protects them, 
and his power perfects them. It condemns war and weapons 
of death : it says that Tao does not employ them, and all good 
men abhor them. Jt also condemns the possession of worldly 
wealth as being in opposition to a spiritual life, and as denoting 
the absence of good from the soul. Modesty, mercy, benevo- 
lence, and contentment are recommended as the highest of hu- 
man virtues. An extensive commentary, written by a Chinese 
saint about 160 B.C., goes with this book to explain it, as all 
"divine revelations" have to be revealed over again by the 
priests, who seem to assume that Infinite Wisdom is too igno- 
rant of human Language to dictate a hook that can be under- 
stood. .Must it not be mortifying to him to have his blunders 
thus exposed? 






CHINESE BIBLES. 53 

Analogy of the Chinese and Jewish Religions. 

The Christian historian, Mr. Milne, expressed a fear that he 
might be condemned for furnishing proof, that, before Jesus was 
born, a morality as pure was inculcated in the celestial empire 
(China). As in the Hindoo, Egyptian, and Persian religions, 
we find the Jewish and Christian religions here amalgamated 
together. The Chinese had a cosmogony, or story of creation, 
similar in some respects to those already noticed. These sacred 
books speak of a primitive paradise, in which was a tree of 
knowledge and a tree of life ; also of a deluge and an ark. Bap- 
tism, the cross, and the miter are emblematical rites of their 
religion. They also taught the doctrine of the eucharist and the 
trinity, and practiced circumcision. 

The Chinese have a story or tradition of an incarnate God, 
Natigai, who, like Christ, was both creator and mediator. His 
sj^stem of religious faith taught the doctrine of special provi- 
dences, future rewards and punishments, a general judgment- 
day, the duty of humility or self-abasement, and the moral and 
religious obligation to observe strict temperate habits, and to 
devote our whole lives to God, &c. 

The Chinese religion inculcates many beautiful and sublime 
moral precepts, which we have not space to notice here. 

Antiquity of the Chinese Religion. 
f The historical books of China, comprising a hundred and fifty 
volumes, and called "The Great Annals, " and recently trans- 
lated by a scientific Frenchman, have a regular chronolog}^, be- 
ginning nearly two thousand six hundred years before the period 
assigned for the creation of Adam. And they have calculations 
in astronomy at that remote period. (The learned men of Eu- 
rope have decided that they made the calculation of an eclipse 
about seven hundred years before the time of Moses. These 
facts are sufficient to prove the existence of their religion long 
anterior to the time of Adam. 

Concluding Inference. 
In addition to the facts and authorities we have cited to show 
that the Hindoo, Egyptian, Persian, and Chinese religions were 



54 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

all established prior to that of the Jews, there are other facts 
which demonstrate the absolute impossibility of any of these 
religions obtaining any of their religious elements or doctrines 
from the Jews. 

1. We find both the Jewish and Christian doctrine inter- 
woven into each one of those Oriental systems. Hence, if they 
borrowed one, they borrowed both. But that is impossible : 
for the Christian system is known to be much }^ounger. 

2. Those Oriental religions are all conservative in character; 
so that there has been scarcely any perceptible change in their 
doctrines during the thousands of years of their known exist- 
ence. Hence their very nature would preclude them from bor- 
rowing any new doctrines. 

3. On the contrary, the Jewish mind has been very vacillat- 
ing. A disposition to change their religion has been constantly 
manifested through their whole history. Such facts ,as these 
settle the question. 



55 



CHAPTER IX. 

I. The Soffees' Bible — The Musnavi. 
The Bible of the Soffees, the " Musnavi/ ' teaches that God 
exists everywhere and in every thing ; that the soul of man, and 
the principle of life throughout all nature, are not from God, 
but of God, and constitute a part of his essence ; that nothing 
exists essentially but God ; and that ' ' all nature abounds with 
Divine Life." Mr. Malcom, in his " History of the Moguls " 
(p. 269), says : "The Soffees are incessantly occupied in 
adoring the Almighty, and in a search after truth." They are 
passionately fond of poetry and music (two essential elements 
of civilization) . Their Bible teaches many beautiful moral les- 
sons. 

II. The Parsees' Bible — "Bour Desch." 

The Parsees' Bible is entitled Bour Desch, which means 
"Genesis; or, the Beginning of Things." Its cosmogony is 
similar to that of Moses, though more definite, and probably 
written at an earlier period. Its Eden, or primitive paradise, 
lasted three thousand years before Kipo (the Devil) entered, 
plucked the fruit, handed it to the woman, and thus caused her 
downfall, and, after her, that of the whole human race. 

III. The Tamalese Bible. 

We have space for but little more than the titles of other Bi- 
bles. 

The Tamalese "Holy Book" was known as the " Kali- 
wakam" and contains some excellent moral precepts. 

IV. Scandinavian Bible. 
Saga, meaning "Wisdom," is the name of the Scandinavian 
" Inspired Volume," so called because it was believed to have 
emanated from the fountain of divine wisdom. 



56 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

V. The Kalmucs' Bible. 

Kaliocham, the Kalmucs' Bible, was believed to contain in 
repletion " all the wisdom of God and man." 

VI. The Athenian Bible. 

The ancient Athenians had what they claimed to be a " Holy 
and God-derived Book," called " The Testament." Dinarchus 
alludes to it in his speech against Demosthenes. It was read 
with deep, solemn awe and devoutness. 

VII. The Cabalists' Bible. 

Yohar, or "Book of Light," the Bible of the Cabalists, re- 
lates some wonderful cures and miracles performed by that sect. 



THE MAHOMEDAN BIBLE. 57 



CHAPTER X. 

The Mahomed an Bible — The Koran. 

The Koran, or Alkoran, is the most modern in its origin of any 
in the list, having been penned six hundred years later than the 
Christian Bible. It differs from most other Bibles in being the 
production of a single author, and, for this reason, possesses 
more uniformity of style and fewer contradictions than most 
other Bibles. Mahomet did not claim to be its author, and did 
not write it, but merely dictated it to his secretary Zaid. Like 
the founder of the Christian religion, and nearly all the other 
great religions of the world, he was very illiterate. Incarnate 
Gods and religious chieftains possess no aspiration to become 
scholars, and no taste for science. They were governed by feel- 
ing and the impulse of religious enthusiasm, which have no affin- 
ity for science. Mahomet, however, did not profess to be a God, 
but merely a prophet. The Koran, having originated in a later 
and more enlightened age than the Christian Bible, possesses 
some superior features, and, of course, is superior to still older 
Bibles. It is more consistent in its teachings on the subject of 
temperance, as it does not, like the Christian Bible, both sanc- 
tion and condemn the use of intoxicating drinks ; but uniformly 
forbids the use of it, and even prohibits the manufacture of it. 
It also shows more respect for the rights of woman b}^ provid- 
ing for her maintenance by dowry. It levies a tax on its dis- 
ciples of two and one-fourth per cent for the support of the poor. 
It enjoins not only kindness and respect for enemies, but a care- 
ful provision for their wants. 

The disciples of the Koran were laught and believed that 
the Holy Book was originated in heaven, and had long been 
preserved there by its divine author Allah, and, in the fullness 
of time, was handed down, chapter at a time, by the angel 



58 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. - 

Gabriel to the prophet Mahomet ; and his scribe Zaid recorded it. 
The leading doctrines of the Koran are : the Unity of the God- 
head, and the perfection of his attributes ; the joys of paradise, 
and the terrors of hell ; the awful fate of unbelievers in the 
Koran. The Day of Judgment is held up as a terror to evil- 
doers and skeptics, and an encouragement to the faithful. Skep- 
tics, or unbelievers in the Koran and the Mahomedan religion, 
are repeatedly consigned to the same terrible fate (the fires of 
hell) that Christ consigns the unbeliever in the Christian religion, 
and the same as that to which the founders of other religions 
doom those who reject or disbelieve their pretended revelations. 
The Koran abounds in precepts of a high moral tone. 

Mahomet holds out the idea that Christ was created like 
Adam, and therefore was but a man, though a true servant of 
God. This, he asserts, was the view of Christ himself. The 
doctrine that God could have a son, or that there could be more 
than one person in the Godhead, was to him profanity, infidelity, 
and downright blasphemy. It is repeatedly denounced in strong 
terms in the Koran. All prayer and praises to God are ad- 
dressed to him in the singular number. I will cite a few texts 
in illustration : '" Praise be to God, Lord of all worlds, the com- 
passionate and merciful King. Thee only do we worship, and 
to thee only do we cr}^ for help. Guide us in the right path." 
"The sun is God's noonday brightness; the moon followeth 
him : the day revealeth his glory ; and the night enshroucleth 
him." u lie built the heavens, and spread forth the earth." 
L - And whoso shall fear God, and do good works, no fear shall 
come upon them, neither shall they be put to grief. But those 
who turn away from him, he will consign to eternal fire." " To 
those who believe (the Koran), and do things which are right, 
hath God promised forgiveness and a noble recompense." 

II. The Mormons 1 Bible — The Book of Mormon; also 
" Tin: Revelations of Joseph Smith." 

Tliis sacred book Is claimed to have been found inscribed on 
gold plates, situated several feet below the surface of the earth, 
in Wayne County, N.Y., in the year 1823, by Joseph Smith, a 
pious youth, then only fourteen years of age, who declared he 



THE MOBMONS' BIBLE. 59 

received information with respect to the existence of the plates 
and their locality from an angel of the Lord, with whom he had 
had frequent intercourse for several years. The following is a 
description of the plates and original records composing the 
book, as furnished by Orson Pratt, one of the " Latter-day 
Apostles" of Jesus Christ: " The records were engraven on 
plates which had the appearance of gold. Each plate was not 
far from seven by eight inches in length and width, being not 
quite as thick as common tin. They were filled on both sides 
with engravings in Egyptian characters, and bound together in 
a volume as the leaves of a book, fastened at one edge with 
three rings running through the whole. This volume was some- 
thing near six inches in thickness, a part of which was sealed. 
The characters, or letters, upon the unsealed part were small and 
beautifully engraven. The whole book exhibited many marks 
of antiquity in its construction, and skill in its engravings. 
With the records was found a curious instrument called by the 
ancients ' Urim and Thummim,' which consisted of two trans- 
parent stones, clear as crystal, set in the two rims of a bow. 
It was used in ancient times by persons called seers, by means 
of which they received revelations of things past or future." 

Mr. Smith finally succeeded, with the aid of a profound lin- 
guist in New- York City by the name of Anthon, in translating the 
whole work into the English language. Several writers testify 
that the ground out of which the records were dug was solid, and 
covered with a thick and solid growth of grass, presenting no 
appearance of having ever been disturbed. The sect now con- 
stitutes about three hundred thousand disciples. The following 
testimony to the truth of the story is a voluntary offering by 
three witnesses : — 

Testimony of Three Witnesses. 

Be it known unto all nations, tongues, kindred, and people unto whom this work shall 
come, that wc, through the grace of God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, have 
seen the plates which contain this record, Which is a record of the people of Nephi, and 
also of the Lamanites. Men, brethren, and also of the people of Jared. And we also 
know that they have been translated by the gift and power of G-od ; for his voice hath de- 
clared it unto us : wherefore we know of a surety that the work is true. And we also tes- 
tify that we have seen engravings which are upon the plates ; and they are shown unto us 
by the power of God, and not of man. And we declare with words of soberness, that an 
angel of God came down, and that he brought and laid before our eyes, and we beheld 



60 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

and saw, the plates and the engravings thereon. And we know it is by the grace of God 
and our Lord Jesus Christ that we beheld and bare record that these things are true, and 
it is marvelous in our eyes. Nevertheless the voice of the Lord commanded that we should 
bear record of it. Wherefore, to be obedient to the commandments of God, we bear tes- 
timony of these things. And we know, that if we are faithful in Christ, we shall rid our 
garments of the blood of all men, and be found spotless before the judgment-seat of Christ, 
and shall dwell with him eternally in heaven. And the honor be to the Father and the 
Son and the Holy Ghost, which are one God. Amen. 

Oliveb Cowdery. 

David Whitmer. 

Martin Harris. 

Mormon Sacred Book, No. 2 — The Book of Doctrines and 
Covenants ; or, The Revelations of Joseph Smith. 

In addition to the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith originated 
and partly composed a Book of Doctrines and Covenants, pur- 
porting to be a direct revelation from heaven relative to the 
temporal government of their church. It enjoined the support 
of the poor, the taxation of members, the establishment of cities 
and temples, the education of the people, the emigration of 
saints, &c. This book has been venerated by the Mormons as 
a "holy revelation from God," and hence is, in a strict sense, 
a Bible. Its title sufficiently indicates its character. As much 
as Christians ridicule the idea of Joseph Smith receiving a reve- 
lation from God, it comes to us with exactly the same authority 
as the claimed-to-be revelation of Moses. The evidence in each 
case is the same. 

III. The Shakers' Bible. 

The Bible of the Shakers is entitled " A Holy, Sacred, and 
Divine Roll from the Lord God of Heaven to the Inhabitants of 
the Earth, Revealed in the Society of New Lebanon, Columbiana 
County, New York, United States of America." The testi- 
mony of eleven mighty angels is given, who are said to have 
attended the writing of the Roll. A copy of the Holy Book lias 
been s< n\ to every king and potentate on earth. Its contents 
and style bear some resemblance to the Christian Bible; and it 
contains texts which .appear to have been drawn from that book, 
and then altered. It should be borne in mind that the Shakers 
i profess to believe in the Christian Bible, with their own 
peculiar construction of the book, like other sects. 



THE JEWISH BIBLE. - 61 



CHAPTER XI. 

The Jewish Bible. 

In a practical sense, there are other books beside the Old 
Testament which go to make up the Jewish Bible. The Talmud, 
or rather the two Talmuds ; the Jerusalem Talmud (comprising 
the Mishna, or Second Law), compiled about 150 B.C. by a 
Jewish rabbi ; and the Bab}4onian Talmud, compiled about six 
hundred and fifty years later, — are regarded by the Jews as 
equally inspired and equally binding in their moral requisitions 
as that of the Old Testament. In fact, they compare the 
former to wine, and the latter to water, when speaking of their 
relative value. Some " tall stories " are found in these Jewish 
revelations, such as these : it tells of a bird so tall that the 
water of a river in which it stood came only to its knees, though 
the water was so deep that it took an ax, thrown into it, seven 
years to reach the bottom ; and of an egg of such enormous 
dimensions, that, when broken, the white of it glued a whole 
town together and a forest of three hundred cedar-trees. These 
are but specimens of their miracles. Such is the character of 
the Jewish sacred writings, emanating from the same source as 
the Old Testament ; and consequently of equal authority and 
reliability, and equally entitled to our belief. 



62 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER XII, 

The Christians' Bible. 

The Christian Bible, as now accepted by Protestants (for it 
must be borne in mind that it has been altered and amended on 
various occasions, thus altering the canonical Word of God), 
is composed of thirty-nine books in the Old-Testament de- 
partment, and twenty-seven in the New ; the whole constitut- 
ing a multifarious collection of old oracles, obsolete dogmas, 
Oriental legends, ancient myths, religious reveries, beautiful 
precepts, poetry, heart-touching pathos, wild fancies, preceptive 
admonitions, martial exploits, domestic regulations, broken, 
disjointed narratives, ritual rules, and spiritual ideas ; including 
also cosmogony, history, theocracy, theology, annals, romance, 
prophecy, rhapsody, psalmodj', mythology, allegory, dreams, 
tradition, legislation, ethics, politics, and religion, all jumbled 
together without arrangement, division, classification, or order ; 
committed to writing in various ages and nations and countries, 
and by various writers, extending over a period of several thou- 
sand years, including nearly every form of composition known to 
human ingenuity, — gay, grave, tragical, logical, philosophical, 
religious, and romantic, — emanating from Gods, angels, men, 
and devils ; recorded, some of it in mountains, some of it in 
caves, some of it on the banks of rivers, some of it in forests, some 
of it in deserts, and someof it under the shadow of the PjTamids. 
It commenced on Mount Boreb, and ended in the isle of Pat- 
mos. From such circumstances we are not surprised to learn 
thai its chronology is unreliable, chimerical, and incorrect; its 
history contradictory and incredible; its philosophy fallacious 5 
Its logic unsound ; its cosmogony foolish and absurd; its astron- 
omy fragmentary and childish; its religion pagan-derived; its 



THE CHBIST1ANS* BIBLE. 63 

morals defective, sometimes selfish, often extravagant, and in 
some cases pernicious. Its government, both temporal and 
spiritual, is, to some extent, both barbarous and tyrannical ; 
while its theocracy is mere brute force. It presents us with 
narratives without authorities, facts and figures without dates, 
and records without names. We find no order in its arrange- 
ment, no system in its subjects or the manner of presenting 
them, and no connection in its paragraphs, and often no agree- 
ment in its statements, and no sense in its logic. It seems to 
teach nearly every thing upon nearly every question of morals 
which it touches. It apparently both sanctions and condemns 
nearly every species of crime to which it refers, and pours ful- 
some laudations upon the heads of some of the most bloody- 
minded and licentious men, — such as David, Solomon, &c, — 
and holds them up as examples of true practical morality. It is 
often dark, ambiguous, and mysterious, as well as contradictory, 
not only in its lessons of morality, but in its account of the sim- 
plest occurrences, thus rendering it comparatively worthless as 
a moral guide ; inasmuch as it is much easier to find out what is 
right and what is not without going to the Bible, than it is to 
find out what the Bible teaches upon the subject, or what it in- 
tends to teach in any given case. With respect to war, slavery, 
polygamy, and the use of intoxicating liquors, for example, it 
is much easier to determine whether they are right or wrong by 
the moral fitness of things than whether they are scriptural or 
anti-scriptural ; while it is silent upon many crimes which now 
infest society. If we are compelled to determine the character of 
some actions without going to the Bible, why not that of all other 
moral actions and duties? Edmund Burke says of the Bible, 
" It is necessary to sort out what is intended as example, and 
what only as narrative ; what is to be understood literally, and 
what figuratively, where one precept is to be controlled and mod- 
ified by another ; what is temporary, and what of perpetual ob- 
ligation ; what is appropriate to one state or set of men, and 
what is the general duty of men in all age$." Now, who can not 
see that all this must require a quality J) mind capable of deter- 
mining or learning moral principles andjaaoral duties without 
recurrence to the Bible ? And it must require a vast amount of 



64 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

time to accomplish this task, all of which is lost, inasmuch as 
it is consuming time in making the Bible conform to what yow 
have already learned of right outside its pages, — time that 
might be much better employed. Such are the moral aspects 
of the Bible. But it also has its beauties, which we need not 
occupy much space in depicting, as we have fifty thousand cler- 
gymen in this country who attend faithfully to that matter. 
Suffice it to sa} T , that portions of it are characterized by a 
high-toned spirituality, other portions by a deep, heart-stirring 
pathos. And then we have manifested in other parts the most 
devout piety, while the books of the prophets often breathe 
forth a spirit of the most elevating poetry. And there is scarcely 
a book, or even a chapter, in the whole Bible, that does not 
evince a spirit of religious devotion, and an effort for the right, 
though often misdirected. Taken as a whole, the Bible may be 
regarded as an exposition of the condition of science, morals, 
religion, government, and domestic polity of the era in which it 
was written, and suited to the temporal and spiritual wants of the 
people of that age, for whom it was written, but not for this age. 
When regarded in this light, and as simply a human production 
of the best minds of the age and times in which it was written, 
man}' portions of it can be read with interest and instruction. 
But when read, as it has been for centuries, as a perfect, 
divine composition, designed for all time and as a finality in 
faith and practice and moral progress, it becomes a stumbling- 
block in the path of progress, an embargo upon free thought, 
a Better upon the soul, a fog of bewilderment to the mind, and 
a drag-chain to the moral and intellectual reformation of the 
world. 



GENERAL ANALOGIES OF BIBLES. 65 



CHAPTER XIII. 

General Analogies of Bibles. 

From the foregoing brief analysis of the characters of the 
Bibles of various nations, it will be observed that they are, in 
their main or leading features, essentially alike, including the 
Holy Books of Jews, Christians, and pagans ; that they are 
alike in their ends and aims and main characteristics ; that all 
inculcate the same fundamental doctrines ; that all impart and 
enjoin the observance of intrinsically the same moral lessons, 
the same preceptive aphorisms. All teach substantially the 
same superstitions, the same kind of miraculous feats performed 
by Gods, angels, and men and devils, the same marvelous stories 
and achievements over-ruling and over-riding the great laws of 
nature, often checking or stopping the ponderous wheels of the 
machinery of the universe. The revelations on the pages of 
each are claimed to be God-derived, and to have been inspired 
through prophets, orators, angels, apostles, or " holy men ; " or to 
have issued directly from the mouth of God, and descended from 
his immaculate throne to earth, without the intervention or 
employment of a medium. Each puts forth similar notions and 
traditions concerning Gods, deities, or angels, genii, demons, or 
evil spirits, priests, prophets, patriarchs, pra} T ers, sacrifices, 
penances, ceremonies, rituals, Messiahs, redeemers, intercessors, 
sin-atoning, crucified Saviors, sons of God, &c. All recog- 
nize the doctrine of atonement for sin ; all, or nearly all, approxi- 
mate in their modes of propitiating the favor of an offended 
Deity by oblations, sacrifices, and offerings of animals, men, or 
Gods, or sons of God. Each has its cosmogony ; each proclaims 
the doctrine of one supreme God, the doctrine of the immor- 
tality of the soul, of post-mortem rewards for " deeds done in 



OQ THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

the body," — endless bliss for the righteous, and punishment for 
the wicked. Each attests the truth and divine origin of its 
religion by the record of a long array of the most astonishing 
miracles, confirmed and ratified by the fulfillment of numerous 
prophecies. Most of them teach the doctrine of the primeval 
innocence and moral elevation of man, and of his fall, and of his 
prospective subsequent restoration ; and also of the necessity 
of a wi change," or " being born again," in order to a full recon- 
ciliation with God, and a perfect state of righteousness. In a 
word, all had essentially the same religious institutions, and the 
same ecclesiastical orders of priests, pilgrims, monks, and mis- 
sionaries ; the same or similar prayers, liturgies, sermons, 
hymns, and sacrificial offerings ; similar holy orders of saints, 
angels, and martyrs. All had their "holy clays," their "holy 
fasts and feasts," "holy rivers," "holy mountains," and 
"holy temples," &c. ; and nearly all preached essentially the 
same doctrines relating to a spiritual birth, regeneration, pre- 
destination, and a future life, rewards, and punishments, and a 
final judgment, &c. All furnish a religion cut and dried (the 
great end of all Bible creeds) so as to save the intellectual labor 
and mental toil of discovering the rule of right and the road to 
duty by an investigation of the great laws of cause and effect, 
the nature and constitution of the human mind, and the moral 
fitness of things. As a finale to creation, and a final consumma- 
tion and triumph of their peculiar faith, each imagines and 
portrays a great prospective millennial epoch, at which juncture 
the heavens are to be " rolled together as a scroll ; " the oceans, 
^. lakes, and rivers to take lire, and be reduced to ashes; 
" the New .Jerusalem to deseend from God out of heaven ; " and 
peace, righteousness, and happiness unalloyed to rule and to 
reign thenceforth and lor ever. Hence all Bibles and religions 
are <>t* divine origin, or none. 

\'<>i •!•;. — Sir William Jones says the ancient religions borrowed from 
each other. 

II. Superior Features of Heathen Bibles. 

There IS n<>t one Oriental Bible in all the number but that is 
superior in ><>me respects in its teachings to the Christians' Bible. 



GENERAL ANALOGIES OF BIBLES. 67 

None of them sanction so explicitly every species of crime ; 
none of them contain so much obscene language. On the con- 
trary, the Chinese Bible, as Mr. Meadows says, ''contains not 
one sentence but that may be read with propriety in any drawing- 
room in England." Strikingly different from that of the 
Christian Bible, as shown in Chap. XXIII. The Mahome- 
dan Bible is quite superior in its teachings, both with respect to 
intemperance and the treatment of women. It forbids both the 
use and the traffic in intoxicating drinks, and also the manufac- 
ture ; while the Christian Bible, although condemning one, sanc- 
tions both (see Chap. LVIII.) . With respect to women, it con- 
tains some commendable precepts. It not only enjoins husbands 
to treat their wives properly, and provide for them, but provides 
for their divorce in case this is not done ; while the Christian 
Bible, by the authority of Christ, allows divorce for no crime, 
abuse, cruelty, or inhuman treatment on the part of tyrannical, 
wicked, or drunken husbands, but that of fornication (see Matt, 
v. 32) . The Koran also enjoins a tax of two and a half per cent 
on its disciples to support the poor ; while the Christian Bible 
sa}'s, u Thou shalt not countenance a poor man in his cause " 
(Ex. xxiii. 3), though it is true it contains counter-precepts. 
These examples are sufficient to lead to the conclusion that 
nothing would be gained to the cause of practical morality by 
supplanting any of the Oriental Bibles with the Christian Bible. 



68 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

The Infidels' Bible. 

We find the remarkable admission in the Christian Bible, that 
the moral guide adopted by infidels is superior to that book 
which Christians have adopted for a guide. Paul, in his Epistle 
to the Romans, says, " The Gentiles, who have not the Bible, 
do by nature the things contained in the Bible." An astonish- 
ing Bible concession, truly ! He, however, uses the word ' ' law ' ' 
for Bible ; but commentators tell us the law is contained in the 
Bible, and some writers make "law" and " Bible" synony- 
mous terms. We therefore give the sense more fully by ren- 
dering it u Bible " instead of " law." It is here admitted by 
Paul, that the great Bible of Nature, written upon man's con- 
sciousness, and inscribed upon eveiy thing around him, which is 
the infidels' Bible and revelation, is superior to an}' printed 
Bible. If man learns by nature the moral lessons taught b} T the 
Bible or moral law (that is, by nature's laws, as learned by ob- 
servation and experience, which is the infidel's sole reliance for 
learning the great lessons and duties of life), then this natural 
revelation, which Paul commends so highly, is superior to any 
written or printed revelation. If, as Paul teaches, the ignorant, 
illiterate Gentile can learn by this revelation of nature, or law 
of nature, the duties of life, the great truths of salvation, and 
the right load to heaven, then it must be greatly superior to the 
Christians 1 Bible. For it is admitted by Christians themselves 
(foreign missionaries), that, with all the aid that priests and 
commentators can render, there is a considerable portion of 
their Bible which the heathen can not learn or be made to under- 
stand. But not so, acccfrding to Paul, with God's natural Bible, 
and the revelation inscribed on man's moral nature, and learned 



THE INFIDELS' BIBLE. 69 

by the exercise of his common sense, natural judgment, and the 
experience of mankind in general. Hence we have a Bible 
which is not only easily read and easily understood by even the 
unlettered heathen, but a Bible which possesses many advantages 
over all printed Bibles, some of which I will mention. In the 
first place, it is a Bible always open. It can not be kept closed 
under lock and key, as the Christian Bible has been in past 
ages. Second, It is a Bible that needs no translation in any 
language ; for it is already written in the languages of all the na- 
tions of the earth. Third, It is a Bible, thank God ! that all, 
whether high or low, learned or unlearned, can read and under- 
stand. Its glorious truths are easily read ; for they are plainly 
and legibly inscribed upon every leaf and page of the soul of 
every human being. Fourth, Hence this revelation needs no 
priest to expound it, and no church to unravel its mysteries, by 
voluminous commentaries. Sixth, No concordance is needed to 
enable its readers to find its golden gems, which glitter and 
sparkle upon every page. They are what the Quakers call u the 
light within." Seventh, Neither moths nor mice can destroy 
this glorious Bible. Fire can not consume it, nor water wash it 
away. It is imperishable and eternal. It is a Bible into which 
no errors have ever crept, either by printers, transcribers, or 
translators. And (soul- cheering thought !) it is a Bible which 
contains all the important doctrines, principles, and precepts 
which can be found in any perishable paper-and-ink Bible, and 
all the grand truths that God ever vouchsafed to man. They can 
all be found in this golden-leaved Bible, this eternal, soul-saving 
revelation of God. 

Paul refers to this natural Bible, or revelation, again when he 
says, u Know ye not of yourselves what is right? " — that is, by 
the Bible planted in your own souls, the revelation stereotyped 
upon }T>ur own moral sense or moral nature. Hence the vir- 
tual acknowledgment by Paul (who is Bible authority), that 
there is no necessity of running to any printed or paste- 
board Bible to learn the truths of the gospel or the duties of 
life ; for he teaches the important lesson, that we may learn 
them in our own inward selves. We can " know of ourselves 
what is right." And there are other texts which admit that 



70 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

God's first revelation, and his last and only revelation, to the 
human race, is far superior to that of any books of human ori- 
gin ; and which admit that this glorious revelation can not be found 
in the Christian Bible, or any other perishable book, but existed 
for ages before any paper-and-ink Bible was ever thought of. 
I will quote one other text to prove these statements, and in 
further confirmation of the proposition that the Christian Bible 
itself admits that the infidels' Bible, direct from the hand of 
God, is greatly superior to it in all the essential features and 
principles of a Bible. Paul concedes this when he says, in his 
Epistle to the Romans, " The invisible things of God are clearly 
seen and understood by the things that are made, even his eternal 
power and Godhead " (Rom. i. 20). Now, here it is proved, 
if any thing can be proved by the Bible, that every thing that 
can be learned about God and religion can be found written 
upon the tablets of nature, and inscribed upon every thing that 
is made. For it is declared, that even the "invisible things of 
God" — that is, the great spiritual truths of the kingdom — can 
be seen and learned by the revelations, or lessons, written upon 
things u that are made." A wonderful admission, truly ! It is 
stated, they can not only be seen, but " clearly seen and under- 
stood," by studying the things " that are made," and learning 
their important lessons. If, then, they can be " clearly seen 
and understood," there is not the shadow of a doubt left upon 
the mind as to their truth or meaning : you are not annoyed 
with that perplexity, uncertainty, and painful anxiet}' about the 
meaning of moral lessons they teach, as you are with respect to 
hundreds of texts you find in the Christian Bible. This is 
a grand revelation and declaration and benefit, truly. And 
"even his eternal power and Godhead," — that is, God's charac- 
ter and attributes, — we are here told, can be Learned by reading 
and Btudying this beautiful and easily comprehended Bible, 
written by the finger of God upon every Leaf and page of nature. 
Was there ever a more important, more pleasing, or more beau- 
tiful revelation made to the world than this of Paul's ? And is 
it not surprising that Christians have never noticed tins most 
Important admission? It is an important moral lesson that 
throws their pen-and-ink Bible into the shade, and shows we 



THE INFIDELS 9 BIBLE. 71 

would be better without than with it by substituting God's 
eternal and universal Bible. It will be observed, then, that it is 
shown by different texts of the Bible, that the " Holy Book " 
which came directly from the hands of God is greatly superior 
to that which came through the hands of man. And the fact 
that it is the only Bible, or revelation, that can now be found in 
all countries, and the only Bible that can be read by all nations, 
kingdoms, tongues, and people, and that not one man, woman, 
or child in a hundred, take the world over, can read any other 
Bible but this, is very nearly prima facie evidence that it is the 
only Bible God ever designed for the human race, and that he 
never did impart, and never will impart, any other revelation to 
the world ; that no other Bible is necessary for the moral, religious, 
and spiritual welfare of the race, or to point the road to salvation. 
Hence it is the only Bible we would recommend for the reading 
of the young. It is the only Bible we are certain they can un- 
derstand. It is the only Bible we are certain is free from errors. 
It is the only Bible we are certain has never been altered or 
mistranslated. It is the only Bible we are certain teaches no 
immoral lessons. It is the only Bible which we are certain con- 
tains no vulgar or obscene language, calculated to raise a blush 
on the cheek of modesty, and outrage every feeling of decorum, 
as man} T of the texts found in the Christian Bible do. It is the 
only u Holy Scripture " we can be certain was given forth by 
divine inspiration, and the only sacred volume or " Holy Word " 
which has the full seal and sanction of Almighty God. Read, 
then, and study well, this open and widespread Bible which 
infolds the universe. All the Bibles and religions of the past 
claim to have been authorized by a direct revelation or inspira- 
tion from God. But we are satisfied that no such revelation has 
ever been given forth to any nation in any age of the world. 
For inspiration is now known to be a universal law of the 
natural mind ; an inborn principle of the human soul, which 
all ages and nations, and every human being, have possessed a 
greater or less share of. And the amount of true inspiration 
possessed by each individual depends upon his or her moral, 
intellectual, and spiritual elevation of the soul or mind into the 
higher enjoyment of spiritual bliss where it becomes en rapport 



72 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

with all that is lovely, inspiring, and beautiful in God's uni- 
verse ; where it can take cognizance of great moral problems 
and spiritual truths ; and where it can look through the long 
vista of futurity, and behold the events of coming years rolling 
up toward the threshold of time. This is true inspiration, and 
the spirit of true prophecy. But it is the work of our own 
minds, and not of Deity, and is not confined to any age, nation, 
or religion. It depends upon the culture of the moral and intel- 
lectual faculties and the spiritual aspirations of the individual, 
and not upon his creed or religious belief. 

As for a divine revelation, it can not be found in any book of 
human origin. It could not be incorporated into a book, nor 
could all the books in the world contain it. It is inscribed all 
over the face of nature. We read it upon the outstretched 
earth and upon the shining heavens ; we read it upon 

" Every bush and every bower. 
Every leaf and every flower." 

Here, then, we have a Bible with a revelation as broad as the 
universe. Its lids are the heavens above, and the earth beneath. 
Its golden-leaf pages are spread out at our feet ; its lessons of 
wisdom, its truths of salvation, and its soul-inspiring beauties, 
are inscribed upon the soul, and written all over the face of 
nature. Head and study it, O man! and become "wise unto 
salvation." 



TWO THOUSAND BIBLE EBB0B8. 73 



CHAPTER XV. 

TWO THOUSAND BIBLE ERRORS. OLD TESTAMENT 
DEPARTMENT. 

A HUNDRED AND TWENTY-THREE ERRORS IN THE STORY OF 
CREATION. 

As the Old Testament possesses no order, no arrangement, 
and no distinct system of either morals or religion, and no 
regular connection in its history, we have to treat it in the same 
unsystematic order in which we find it, and to expose many 
foolish errors and stories which seem almost beneath the dignity 
of any respectable writer to notice. But, as they constitute a 
large portion of the Old Testament, we have got to deal with 
them or nothing. And, although trifling in themselves, they 
have done much mischief. Hence we deem it of greater im- 
portance to expose their evil influence than to trace them to 
their heathen origin, as we originally designed doing. 

1. The first text in the Bible is evidently an error. " In the 
beginning God created the heavens and the earth " (Gen. 1). 
No geologist or philosopher at the present day believes in 
either a creation or a creator. The assumption involves two 
impossibilities. First, a creation could not take place with- 
out something to create from : "Ex nihilo nihil Jit," — " Out of 
nothing nothing can come." Second, to account for the ori- 
gin of the earth, sun, moon, and stars, by assuming the exist- 
ence of a creator, is throwing no light on the subject. We have 
made no progress towards solving the problem ; for we are 
equally puzzled to account for the origin of the creator himself. 
It is as easy to assume that matter always existed as to assume 
that the creator always existed. Hence there would be no crea- 



74 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

tion possible, and none needed. This is now regarded as a set- 
tled scientific problem. 

2. It is a scientific error to assert that matter had a 
beginning, as the Bible assumes. Many scientific facts have 
been developed to establish the conclusion that all beings and 
objects on earth were eliminated from its elements, and all the 
planets we can recognize were an outgrowth from some other 
worlds. The proposition is not only susceptible of much proof 
(which I have not space here to present) , but is very beautiful 
and satisfactory. It " composes our reason to peace.' ' All we 
lack of comprehending it is the capacity to grasp eternity and 
infinity, which finite mortals cannot do. 

3. If God " created the heavens " (Gen. i. 1), and heaven 
is his " dwelling-place ' ' (see 1 Kings viii. 30), then where 
did he dwell before the heavens were made? Here is a very 
puzzling question, and involves an absurdity equal to that 
of the Tonga-Islanders, who teach that the first goose was 
hatched from an egg, and that the same goose laid the egg. 
An idea equally ludicrous is involved in the assumption that God 
created the heavens and the earth about six thousand years ago ; 
so that, previous to that era, there was nothing on which he could 
stand, sit, or lie, but must have been suspended in mid-air from 
all eternity. 

4. If nothing existed prior to six thousand years ago, then 
there was nothing for God to do, and nothing for him to 
do it with. Hence he must have spent an eternity in idleness, 
a solitary monarch without a kingdom. 

5. As we are told God created the light (Gen. i. 3), the 
conclusion is forced upon us, that, prior to that period, he 
had spent an eternity in darkness. And it has been discov- 
ered thai all beings originating in a state of darkness, or living 
in thai condition, were formed without eyes, as is proved by 
Mind Ashes being found in dark caves. Hence the thought is 
suggested, that God, prior to the era of creation (six thousand 
years ago), was perfectly blind. 

6. " God saw the light that it was good " (Gen. i. 4). 
Hence we must Infer that (Jod had just got his eyes open, and 
that he had never before discovered that light is good. Of 
course it was good to be delivered from eternal darkness. 



TWO THOUSAND BIBLE EBRORS. 75 

7. " And God divided the light from the darkness " (Gen. 
i. 4). Hence, previous to that period, they must have been 
mixed together. Philosophy teaches that light and darkness 
never can be separated, any more than heat and cold, as one 
is only a different degree of the other. 

8. " And God called the light Day, and the darkness he 
called Night" (Gen. i. 5). And to whom did he call them? 
as no living being was in existence until several days after- 
wards. Hence there was no need of calling them any thing ; 
and, as we are told Adam named eve^ thing, he could as easily 
have found names for these as for other things. 

9. The Bible teaches us that day and night were created 
three days before the sun. Eveiy school-boy now knows that 
it is the revolution of the earth upon its axis that causes day 
and night ; and, but for the existence of the sun, there could be 
no day and night. If Moses' God was so ignorant, he had 
better never have wakened out of his eternity of darkness. 

10. The Bible teaches that the earth came into exist- 
ence three days before the sun ; but science teaches us that 
the earth is a child or offshoot of the sun. Hence it could 
be equally true to say a son was born three days before his 
father. 

11. "And the earth was without form, and void" (Gen. 
i. 2) ; but philosophy teaches that nothing can exist with- 
out form, or when void. The declaration brings to mind the 
Scotchman's definition of " nothing," — "a footless stocking 
without a leg." We have an idea of a thing which does not 
exist. 

12. " And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of 
the waters" (Gen. i. 2). Here we are taught that the 
original state of the earth was that of water. But geology 
teaches its original constituents was fire or fusion ; that water 
did not exist, and could not exist, in it, or on it, for millions of 
ages. Professor Agassiz says our earth was once in a state of 
igneous fusion, without water, without rain, and even without an 
atmosphere (''Geological Sketches," i. 2) . And even the pious, 
God-fearing Hugh Miller says that " the solid earth was at one 
time, from center to circumference, a mass of molten matter " 



76 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

( u Lectures on Geology," 256) . Here we have geology against 
theology. 

13. God spent a day making a firmament, by which he 
" divided the waters from the waters." If it had then stated 
that he spent a day in making moonshine, or one day in 
making breath for Adam, it would have been as sensible ; for 
the firmament is as truly a part of the earth (being eliminated 
from it) as our breath is a part of our bodies. 

14. "Divided the waters from the waters." Here is dis- 
closed a belief which prevailed in various Oriental and heathen 
nations, that the earth exists between two large lakes, or 
sheets of water ; and that the firmament is a solid floor, which 
holds the water up, and prevents it from falling, and inun- 
dating the earth ; and, being supplied with doors and windows, 
when God wants it to rain he opens the windows (the Bible 
says " the windows of heaven were opened," see Gen. vii. 11), 
He pours it down by opening the windows, and stops it by 
shutting them up. " The windows of heaven were stopped " 
(Gen. viii. 2). How fully is the heathen tradition disclosed 
here ! 

15. We are told that God gathered "the waters under 
heaven together unto one place" (Gen. i. 9). How ignorant 
he must have been of geography ! He evidently had not studied 
the science, or had not traveled much, or he would have known 
the waters under heaven never have been "gathered together 
unto one place," but exist in many places, as the two hundred 
large lakes prove. 

16. The Bible tells us, that, when God created the vegeta- 
ble kingdom, he ordered each species of vegetation to "bring 
forth after its kind" (Gen. i. 11). Can we suppose that 
apple-trees would have borne bucl^cs, or mullein-stalks pro- 
duced pumpkins, or any thing foreign to their nature, if the 
oommand had not been given for each to bring forth after its 
kind? 

17. According to the Bible, the vegetable kingdom was 
created before the animal; but the learned geologist Ilitch- 

&, although a Christian by profession, in his " Elements of 
Geology " says, " An examination of the rocks shows us that 



TWO THOUSAND BIBLE ERRORS. 77 

animals were created as early as vegetables ' ' (and he might 
have said much earlier) . And yet the Bible sa} T s vegetables 
were created on the third day, and animals on the fifth (see 
Gen. i.). 

18. The Bible represents vegetables as coming into existence 
before the sun ; but philosophy teaches that they could neither 
germinate nor grow without the warming and vivifying influence 
of the sun. 

19. The Bible tells us that " God made two great lights, 
the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule 
the night ; and God set them in the firmament to give light 
to the earth" (Gen. i. 16, 17). That is, he made two round 
balls, and then stuck them into a hole scooped out of the 
firmament for the purpose. This seems to be the idea. Here 
is disclosed the most egregious ignorance of astronomy. Think 
of that stupendous solar luminary, as much larger than this 
P3'gmy planet as a man is larger than a mouse, being hung up or 
stuck up above us for our sole accommodation ! How sublimely 
ridiculous ! 

20. The Bible represents the great world-builder, the almighty 
architect, as spending five days in plodding and toiling at this 
little mole-hill of ours before he got it finished up to his notion, 
and then made such a bad job of it that he repented for 
having undertaken it. 

21. But when he came to make the countless worlds, the 
vast suns, and systems of suns, which roll their massive 
forms in every direction around the earth, these were all 
made in a few hours. "And he made the stars also." This 
text tells the whole story of the origin of the boundless planet- 
ary S} r stem, comprising millions of worlds larger than our plan- 
et. What superlative ignorance of astronomy Moses' God 
manifests ! 

22. Moses is awarded great credit by Bible believers for 
opposing polytheism, and teaching the existence of but one 
God : but it would have been more to his credit if he had 
stuck to a belief in a plurality of Gods ; for it would take a 
million of such Gods as his imagination has created a thousand 
years to make such a universe as astronomers have brought to 
light since he wrote. 



78 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

23. The language, "Let us make man in our own image" 
(Gen. i. 26), seems to imply that there was an association of 
gods, — a company of almighty mechanics, who had formed 
a copartnership to do up a big job. 

24. If man was made in the image of God, why was he 
cursed for eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge in order 
to be like God ? 

25. According to the Bible, God became so tired in the 
business of world-making that he had to take a rest of a whole 
day (and perhaps took a nap also) when the job was com- 
pleted ; but geology and philosophy both teach that creation 
never was begun, and never will be finished, but is going on 
all the time. Hence new species of animals and vegetables are 
constantly coming into existence. 

26. The Bible represents the entire universe as being created 
less than six thousand years ago ; but science teaches us 
that it has been in existence for millions of 3-ears. 

27. A large volume of scientific facts has been accumu- 
lated by scientists, showing that even our earth, one of the 
youngest of the planets, is at least several hundred thousand 
years old. Look at a few of the facts which go to prove it. 
The coral reefs of Florida are estimated by Professor Agassiz 
to be one hundred and thirty-five thousand years old. Charles 
Lyell estimates the delta of the Mississippi Valley to be 
at least one hundred thousand years old. Four growths of 
cypress-trees far below the surface of the ground, and situated 
one above another, have been discovered near New Orleans, 
whose successive growths must have occupied a period of at 
least one hundred and fifty thousand years. So much for the 
agreement of geology and Bible chronology. 

28. But we are told that a day in the Bible means a 
thousand years. Then, as the sabbath day constitutes one 
of the days spoken of in the Bible, and was provided as a 
day of rest, Christians and Bible believers should rest a thou- 
sand years at a time; and, as God rested a whole day (a thou- 
sand years), he must have been as tired of resting as he was of 
world-making. Why do the figures "4004 B.C." stand at the 
top of the first page of the Bible, if a thousand years mean one 
day? 



TWO THOUSAND BIBLE ERRORS. 79 

29. The Bible teaches that whales, fishes, and birds were 
made on the same day ; but geology assures us that fishes 
came into existence long before fowls. 

30. The Bible teaches that beasts and creeping things 
were all made on the fifth day of creation; but geology tells 
us that reptiles and creeping things crawled upon the earth mil- 
lions of }^ears before beasts came into existence. 

31. The Bible represents man as coming into existence 
about six thousand years ago ; but human bones have recently 
been discovered in the vicinity of New Orleans which Dr. 
Dowler estimates to be at least fifty thousand years old. 

32. A deity who becomes so tired and physically exhausted 
with six days' labor as to be compelled to stop and rest, 
physiolog} r teaches would be liable to physical disease ; and, 
if plrysically diseased, it might terminate in death, and thus 
leave the world without a God (Godless) . 

33. The Bible tells us "the Lord God formed man of 
the dust of the ground" (Gen. ii. 7) ; but philosophy teaches 
that dust possesses no vital properties, and that it would 
have been less difficult to make man of a stone or a stump, 
owing to their possessing more adhesive properties. One 
writer suggests that the negro must have been made of coal- 
dust. 

34. According to the Bible, a serious blunder was made 
by Jehovah in the work of creation, by exhausting all the 
materials in the process of world-making and man-making, so 
that nothing was left to make a i i helpmeet ' ' for Adam ; and 
this blunder caused the necessity of robbing Adam of one of 
his ribs. 

35. But common sense teaches us that a small crooked 
bone but a few ounces in weight could not furnish half the 
material necessary to constitute a woman. The Parsees, with 
a little more show of sense, tell us that the rib was used mere- 
ly as a back-bone, around which the woman was constructed ; 
which revives in memory Erin's mode of making cannon, which 
consisted in "taking a round hole, and pouring melted metal 
around it." The Tonga-Islanders have a tradition about as 
sensible as that of Moses with respect to the origin of the first 



80 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

woman. Their God made the first man with three legs, and 
amputated one of them to make a " helpmeet for him." This 
is an improvement, as a leg can be better spared when there are 
three than a rib : it also possesses more material than a rib. 

36. The Bible teaches that man was created upright, but 
fell. If it means plrysically, it can be easily accounted for, 
and must be ascribed to his creator ; for depriving him of one 
of his ribs would leave him in an unbalanced condition, so that 
he would be liable to fall. 

37. The Bible imparts to us the strange intelligence that 
u the Lord God brought all the beasts and birds to Adam 
to see what he would call them" (Gen. ii. 19). What an 
idea for Omniscience or Infinite Wisdom to engage in the 
business of chasing bears, lions, tigers, elephants, and hy- 
enas, and all manner of beasts great and small, and all manner 
of birds, also hissing, crawling, biting reptiles, and eveiy liv- 
ing thing which he had created, and taking them to Adam u to 
see what he would call them ' ' ! Not having sufficient intelli- 
gence to lind names for them himself (pardon the thought) , his 
curiosity was no doubt aroused to see what an ignorant being of 
his own creation, who had not sufficient intelligence to clothe 
himself, would call the innumerable host of beasts, birds, &c, 
before any language was known, or even a single letter was in- 
vented to spell names with. (We are very far from desiring to 
wound the feelings or encroach upon the reverence that any 
man or woman may cherish for "a God of infinite love, wis- 
dom, and goodness ; " but let it be kept constantly in mind we 
are not presenting the history of such a being here, but the 
mere Imaginary God of Moses and the Bible.) 

the Bible tenches thai Adam named all the beasts, 
animals, and birds, it must have occupied a great number 
of years lor the Lord God of Mos^s to have caught and 
taken the several hundred thousand species to Adam to receive 
names in nil the three thousand languages, and then convey 
them back to their respective climates. 

:;:». The question naturally arises, Why should Adam give 
them names by saying, "This is a horse, that is an ass, 
the animal yonder shall be called a hippopotamus/' &c, 



TWO THOUSAND BIBLE ERRORS. 81 

when there was nobody present to hear it and be benefited by 
it? And nobody could have remembered half the names had 
they been present. Here we wish to call the attention of the 
reader specially to the fact that all the thoughts and language 
Tve have so far cited as being either that of God or Moses 
sounds like the utterance of ignorant children, and unworthy 
the dignity of an intelligent and sensible man, much less that of 
a God. 

40. The Bible teaches that " God made man in his own 
image." The reverse statement would have been true, " Man 
made God in his own image ; " for this is true of all nations 
who believe in a God. 

41. Here let it be noted the Bible contains two contradictory 
accounts of creation ; one found in the first chapter of Gen- 
esis, the other in the second. In the first, animals are created 
before man ; in the second, after man. 

42. The first chapter of Genesis sa}^s, " Let the earth bring 
forth plants" (Gen. i. 11) : the second says, " God created 
every plant . . . before it was in the earth" (Gen. ii. 9). 
A contradiction ; and neither statement is true, there being 
no creation. 

43. The first chapter has the earth created several days 
before the firmament, or heaven : the second chapter has it 
created on the same day (Gen. ii. 4) . 

44. The first represents fowls as originating in the water 
(Gen. i. 20) : the second has them created out of the water. 

45. After the first chapter says " God created man in his 
own image" (Gen. i. 27), the second says " there was not 
a man to till the ground " (Gen. ii. 4) . 

46. The first chapter represents man and woman as being 
created at the same time (Gen. i. 27) : the second represents 
the woman as being created after the man. 

47. The first implies that man has dominion over the whole 
earth : the second restricts his dominion to a garden. Which - 
is the inspired story of creation ? 

48. The Mexicans claim that the first man and woman 
were created in their country. The Hindoos aver that the 
original progenitors of the race (Adimo and Iva) first made 



82 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

their appearance amongst them. The Chinese claim a similar 
honor. The Persians contend that God landed the first human 
pair in the land of Iran. And, finally, the Jews affirm that 
Jehovah created the first pair in Eden. 

The Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Life. 

Moses tells us God planted two trees in Eden, one of which 
he called " the tree of the knowledge of good and evil." This 
tree bore fruit which nobody was allowed to taste (Gen. ii. 9). 

49. Why the tree was planted, or wiry its fruit was forbidden 
to be used, are problems which the Bible does not solve, and 
which set reason at defiance. 

50. And then it looks like a senseless act to create a tree 
for the purpose of bearing fruit (as we can conceive of no 
other purpose for which it could have been created)*, and then 
decree that it should all go to waste. 

51. It was worse still to create human beings with an appe- 
tite for this fruit, and place it in their sight, and then forbid 
them to taste it on penalty of death. Nothing could be more 
opposed to our ideas of reason and justice. 

52. Did God create beings in his own image, and then treat 
them' as if he wished to tantalize them and render them 
unhappj- ? 

53. It would seem that he created man for no other purpose 
than to tease and torment him, and quarrel with him. 

54. Common sense would suggest it to be the act of an 
ignoramus or a tyrant to implant in man the desire to eat fruit 
which he did not allow him to eat. 

55. And would it not be unjust to punish Adam and Eve for 
doing what he himself had implanted in them the desire to 

do? 

56. God must have known they would eat the fruit, if he 
were omniscient. 

57. If lie were not omniscient, he was not a God in a 
supreme or divine Bense. 

God must halve had the power without the will to prevent 
the i\c\ of disobedience, which would make him an unjust and 
unmerciful tyrant. 



TWO THOUSAND BIBLE ERRORS. 83 

59. Or else the will without the power, which would make 
him a weak and frail being, and not a God. 

(For a full elucidation of these points, see chapter sixty-nine.) 
We will notice a few other points. 

60. As God declared eating the fruit would make Adam 
" like one of us," that is, Godlike (and all men are enjoined to 
become Godlike), was not Adam, therefore, justified in eating 
the fruit in order to become Godlike ? 

61. In chapter sixty-nine it is shown, that, as Adam and 
Eve got their eyes open by eating the inhibited fruit, the act 
of disobedience turned out to be a great blessing, inasmuch as 
it saved the earth from being filled with a race of blind human 
beings. 

62. And, as this blessing was obtained through the agency 
of the serpent-devil, we must admit " the father of lies" was 
a great benefactor of the human race, as shown in chapter 
sixty-nine. 

63. As Adam could not very well exercise "dominion over 
every living thing that moveth upon the earth" (Gen. i. 26) 
w r hile shut up in a little eight-by-ten garden, we can observe 
here another practical benefit of the act of disobedience which 
drove him from the garden. 

64. Is it not a strange piece of moral incongruity to set 
Adam to tilling the soil in the garden as a blessing, and then 
doom him to till it outside as a curse? (Gen. iii. 23.) He first 
embarked in the business as a blessing, and then as a curse. 
How the same act could be both a blessing and a curse is a 
" mystery of godliness " which swamps us. 

65. The Jews tell us the original tempter was a serpent 
(Gen. iii. 1) ; the Mexicans say it was a demon; the Hindoos 
call him a snake ; the Greeks declare it was a dragon ; 
Josephus supposes it was an ape ; some of the East-India sects 
speak of him as a fish ; but the Persian revelations make it 
a lizard. Which is right ? k . 

66. The Mosaic or Hebrew cosmogony represents the ser- 
pent as dealing out the fruit to the genus homo; while the 
Mexicans, the Egyptians, and the Persians set the serpent or 
" evil genius " to guarding the tree to protect the fruit. Which 
is right ? 



84 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

67. When God Jehovah announced to the trinity of Gods, 
"Behold, the man has become as one of us to know good 
and evil" (Gen. iii. 22), exactly as the serpent had predicted, 
instead of dying as Jehovah had predicted, does it not prove 
that the serpent was the best and most reliable prophet ? 

68. As Adam and Eve could know nothing of the nature 
of right and wrong until they attained that knowledge by eating 
the fruit, does not this fact prove it to be a justifiable if not a 
righteous act? 

69. How could Adam and Eve know that any act was 
sinful before an act of any kind had been committed by which 
the}' could learn the character or consequences of human con- 
duct? 

69. Is it not a logical conclusion, that, if God created 
every thing, he can control every thing, and hence, strictly 
speaking, is alone responsible for the right performance of 
every thing ? 

70. The Christian Bible tells us the first pair of human 
beings sewed fig-leaves together for clothing ; but the Chinese 
revelation say palm-leaves. Which is right? Who can tell? 

71. As it is declared the voice of God was heard " walking 
in the garden" (Gen. iii. 8), we beg leave to ask, what kind 
of a thing is a "walking voice " ? 

72. We also beg leave to ask, who took charge of "the 
house of many mansions ' ' while Jehovah was down among 
the bushes hunting and hallooing for Adam? 

72. And who took charge of creation, and kept the machinery 
of the universe running during the thousand years' rest of 
God Almighty, if the one day he rested means a thousand 
year 

73. Was it necessar} r for an omnipresent God to come down 
from heaven to find Adam when he hid among the bushes? 
And what would have been the result if he had not been 
found? 

71. Must we not conclude that the command to "multiply 
and replenish the earth 91 was rather superfluous, inasmuch 
as nations who never heard of the command perform the duty 
faithfully? 



TWO THOUSAND BIBLE EBBOBS. 85 

75. If the River Gihon, one of the four rivers of Paradise, 
"encompassed the whole land of Ethiopia" (Gen. ii. 13), 
which is in Africa, how did it manage to cross the Red Sea, so 
as to get into Eden, which is in Asia? 

111. As Bishop Colenso shows the territory lying between 
the four rivers in Eden, as mentioned in Gen. ii. comprised an 
area of several hundred miles, we would suggest that father 
Adam, while in Eden, had rather a large garden to cultivate. 

112. How could fig-leaves be sewed together for clothing 
before needles were invented? (see Gen. iii. 7.) 

113. How did Eve see the tree as stated in Genesis (" she 
saw the tree ") before she ate the fruit which caused her eyes 
to be opened ? 

114. Is it not calculated to destroy all ideas of justice in the 
minds of man and woman to believe that God cursed and 
ruined the happiness of the whole human race merely for one 
simple act prompted by a being destitute of moral perception or 
moral accountability ? 

115. And what should we think of a being who would suffer 
a grand scheme, on which is predicated the happiness of his 
innumerable family for untold ages, to be defeated by the wily 
machinations of a brainless creature of his own creation? 

116. Why should Adam hide from God because he was 
naked, when, if God made him, he must have become accus- 
tomed to seeing him in that condition? 

117. If God in the morning pronounced every thing good, 
and in the evening every thing bad, does it not imply not only 
a serious blunder in the job, but a serious mistake in his 
views either in the morning or in the evening ? 

118. As we are told " the Lord God made clothing for Adam 
out of goat-skins," the question naturally arises, Who caught 
and killed the animals, and dressed the skins? Does it not 
imply that God was both a butcher and a tanner? Rather 
plebeian employment for a God. 

119. And the statement that "the Lord God planted a 
garden eastward in Eden" (Gen. ii. 8) seems to imply that 
he was a horticulturist also. 

120. It is pretty hard to believe that Adam could sleep 



86 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES, 

while God Almighty (Moses' God) was digging amongst his 
ribs, as stated in Gen. ii. 21. 

121. How could Adam know what the word "die" meant 
before there had been any deaths in the world, when the Lord 
told him he should die if he ate the forbidden fruit? 

122. As Eve was pronounced " the mother of all living" 
when there were no human beings in existence but she and 
Adam, the inference seems to be that she was the mother of 
herself, her husband, and all the animal tribes. 

123. u In the image of God created he them" (Adam and 
Eve, see Gen. i. 27). If Adam and Eve were both created in 
the image of God, it would seem to follow that he was consti- 
tuted of two genders, male and female. 

In concluding this section, we ask the reader to think of an 
infinitely wise God being defeated in his grand scheme of crea- 
tion or salvation by a crawling serpent, and a frightful hell 
and all its horrors originating from this act. How sublimely 
ridiculous is the thought ! 

II. The Scientists' Account of Creation. 

1 . Millions of years ago the sun in its revolution threw off, as 
it had done on previous occasions, a sort of fire-mist, or nebu- 
lous scintillations, which floated and rolled through space for 
countless ages, gradually accumulating from the atmosphere in 
its revolution, thus swelling in size until it became a conglomera- 
tion of gas ; and, continuing to grow and progress, it ripened 
into a fiery, liquid mass possessing the most intense heat. 

2. After innumerable ages this fiery liquid mass began to 
cool, and finally formed a crust upon its surface. 

3. As its interior elements began to evolve or emanate from 
its bosom, it formed a dense, heavy, murky atmosphere, almost 
as heavy as water, in which no living thing could have breathed 
or lived for a moment, 

4. This atmosphere contained moisture, which in the course 
of time became condensed into globules forming drops, which 
descended to the earth in the shape of rain. 

.'>. This rain, descending to the earth, cooled its surface, and 
eventually tilled its vast cavities with water, and thus formed 



TWO THOUSAND BIBLE ERRORS. 87 

lakes, seas, and oceans. The boiling, heaving mass in the 
bowels of the earth made it very irregular in shape. 

6. As soon as the surface of the earth became sufficiently 
cool, small swellings began to appear upon its surface, present- 
ing the appearance of blisters, or boils. These outgrowths 
finally began to exhibit vegetable life ; but for a long period of 
time they presented the appearance of rocks or stones. 

7. In the mean time the washings from the surface of the 
earth were deposited in the seas and oceans, and, sinking to the 
bottom, in the course of time formed rocks. 

8. These rocks, as they hardened, gave off an element of life, 
which in the course of time supplied the waters with various 
forms of animal or finny life, and thus originated mollusks, 
fishes, &c. 

9. As the surface of the earth cooled and grew thicker, the 
elements of life diffused through the liquid mass finally made 
their appearance on the surface in the character of the lowest 
forms of vegetable life, such as mosses, lichens, ferns, &c. 

10. As the surface of the earth thickened, and consequently 
accumulated the elements of vitality, it gave forth higher and 
still higher forms of vegetable life, till finally the most matured 
forms of matter began to exhibit animal life. 

11. The first species was the zoophite, a compound of vege- 
table and animal life, but possessing scarcely any of the func- 
tions of animal life except those of absorption and respiration, 
and these functions were but slightly manifested. 

12. Succeeding the zoophite came the mollusks and various 
hard-shelled animal forms, which at first clung to the rocks, then 
fed on seaweeds and other vegetable substances, absorbing also 
from the atmosphere. 

13. In this way various species of animals and birds and rep- 
tiles sprang up, ran their course, and then perished, to give 
place to higher forms. 

14. And finally, when all the elements of life became suffi- 
ciently matured, they formed a combination, and turned loose 
upon the earth the animal man, who at first was nearly as ugly, 
clumsy, and awkward as a baboon, possessed of but little more 
sense or intelligence. 



88 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

15. Each one of these changes and outgrowths of the new 
forms of vegetable and animal life constituted an epoch of in- 
numerable ages, thus showing the age of our planet to be beyond 
computation. We submit to the reader whether this is not a 
more rational, beautiful, and satisfactory solution of the great 
problem of mineral, vegetable, animal, and human existence, 
than the jumbled-up medley presented by Moses. 



ABSUBDITIES IN THE ABE AND FLOOD STOBY. 89 



CHAPTER XVI. \° 

ABSURDITIES IN THE AKK AND FLOOD STORY. 

If there were no other errors or absurdities in the Bible, our 
faith in it would diminish at every step in the investigation 
of the ark and flood story as related in the sixth chapter of 
Genesis. The avowed purpose of the flood, the means employed, 
and their failure to accomplish the end desired, are all at war 
with our reason and our moral sense. 

1. The first question that naturally arises in considering 
this story is, Why should so many millions of innocent beings 
— men, women, children, animals, birds, &c. — perish as a pen- 
alty for the sins of a few thousand people? 

2. The reason given for this wholesale destruction was 
the wickedness and moral depravity of the human race. But is 
it true that the whole human race was in that state at that 
period? According to Manetho and Herodotus, Egypt was in a 
state of high civilization and moral culture at the time ; and, 
according to Dr. Hulcle, China was also far advanced in the 
arts of civilization and in morality. Col. Dow and other 
writers represent India as being in a similar condition. There 
could, therefore, be no justice in drowning all these nations in 
order to punish a few thousand rambling Jews : it was too much 
like u burning the barn to destroy the rats." 

3. An enlightened moralist of the present day would decide 
that it was a species of injustice to destroy all the land animals, 
and let the fishes and aquatio animals live. It looks like par- 
tiality. 

4. But God, having discovered that he made a signal fail- 
ure in the work of creation, acknowledged that it ' c grieved 
him at his heart," and that he "repented" having undertaken 



90 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

it. However, he issued a proclamation, stating that " the end 
of all flesh is come : every thing that is in the earth shall die." 

5. " I, even I, do bring a flood of water upon the earth 
to destroy all flesh " (Gen. xi. 6) . The language seems to im- 
ply that somebody else had undertaken, or was about to under- 
take, the business. 

6. But " Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord," and 
was placed at the head of this grand scheme ; being, as was 
assumed, although a drunkard, the most righteous man that 
could be found. 

7. The Lord instructed him to build an ark five hundred 
and fifty feet long, twenty feet wide, and fifty-five feet high, 
— about the size of an eastern warehouse. Think of put- 
ting into this two of every species of animal, and seven of every 
species of clean beast, and fowls of the air ! — there being one 
hundred and fifty thousand, or, as some make it, five hundred 
thousand species of animal, one hundred and twelve thousand 
kinds of bird, and fifty thousand species of insect. 

8. And God ordered to be taken into this ark food suffi- 
-cient to supply these millions of mouths. This alone w r ould 
have required forty such vessels. 

9. As it was declared that God destroyed every living thing 
from the face of the earth, it would have been necessary to 
have food enough stored away to last several years, until the 
earth could have time to be replenished with a new crop of grass 
and vegetables to serve as food for the granivorous and her- 
bivorous species, and animals for the carnivorous tribes. The 
weight of such a cargo would have been sufficient to sink the 
whole British navy ! 

10. Consider for a moment what amount of food would 
be required for each species of animal. The four elephants 
(two of each species) would consume a ton of hay in two 
d;i vs. making more than one hundred and fifty tons in twelve 
months. The, fourteen rhinoceroses would consume one thou- 
sand and fifty tons. And then the horses, cattle, sheep, goats, 
asses, zebras, antelopes, and other mammalia, would require at 
Least two thousand tons more; making in the aggregate three 
thousand two hundred tons. This alone would have filled every 
inch of the vessel. 



ABSUBDITIES IN THE ARK AND FLOOD STORY. 91 

11. The seven hundred and eightj^-four thousand birds 
(one hundred and twelve thousand species) would require 
grain, which would make it necessary to store several thousand 
bushels. 

12. The three thousand flesh-eating animals, including lions 
(one Hon could eat fifteen pounds a day), cats, dogs, jackals, 
hyenas, skunks, weasels, crocodiles, snakes, eagles, hawks, 
buzzards, &c, would require about forty wagon-loads to be 
slaughtered and fed to them each day ; for all would require 
fresh meat but the buzzards. 

13. And otters, minks, gulls, kingfishers, spoonbills, storks, 
&c, would require fish for food, which must either be pre- 
served in tanks for the purpose, or one hundred and fifty 
persons would have to be employed all the time in catching 
them ; and there were only four men to do this and perform all 
the other labor, — sufficient for five thousand hands. 

14. There were nine hundred species of fly-catchers, — 
those that feed on flies, beetles, and other insects. We are 
not informed whether flies were included in the registered list 
or not ; but the}^ would., of course, be imdudent enough to take 
up their quarters in the vessel without invitation. 

15. About two hundred and fifty birds known as bee-catch- 
ers would have to be supplied with this kind of insect : this 
would be, to say the least, rather stinging business. 

16. Many cans of cockroaches must have been saved to feed 
the birds-of-paradise. 

17. There are several kinds of ant-eaters also, which would 
have required much time to be spent in searching for ants in the 
cracks of the vessel, or in collecting them off the water. 

18. The four hundred and forty-two monkeys would require 
fresh fruit ; and it is not probable anybody had the forethought 
to can it for them. 

19. Sixty-five species of animal feed on insects; and it 
would have been necessary for several persons to spend most 
of their time in crawling after millipeds, fleas, wood-lice, &c. 

20. There would have been work for fifty boys in providing 
leaves and flowers (if there were any possibility that they could 
be obtained while merged in twenty-seven feet of water) for 
the animals that feed on these things. -- 



92 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

21. Besides food, fresh water must have been stored up 
for most of these animals, as they could not have endured 
the salty water of the briny deep. 

22. Noah and his family must have studied ornithology and 
natural history many years to know what kind of food to save 
for the various kinds of birds and animals. 

23. Naturalists estimate that there are fourteen different 
climates, each with animals adapted only to the temperature 
and natural growth of that locality. How, then, could they all 
endure the change of being removed to the vicinity of Mount 
Ararat ? Animals from the frigid zones must have felt like fish 
out of water in the warm clirnate of Armenia. 

24. And think of the immense labor required to obtain this 
innumerable collection of animals ! In the first place, either 
Noah or his God must make a trip to the polar regions to 
obtain the white bear, the reindeer, the polar dog, &c. 

25. And then the Rocky Mountains must be scaled to find 
and catch the grizzly bear. Some time and labor must have 
been required to obtain the rattlesnakes, copperheads, vipers, 
cobras, snapping-turtles, &c, of the torrid zone. 

2G. And a great deal of strategy must have been employed 
to catch the fox, the deer, the antelope, the gazelle, the chim- 
panzee, of the temperate zone ; also the eagle, hawk, buzzard, 
&c. 

27. To do all this hunting and catching, and conveying to 
the ark, of the million and a half birds and animals, would 
have required a larger number of persons than Napoleon or 
Xerxes ever commanded ; for, as the whole thing is related as 
a until nil occurrence, we can not assume that the} r made the 
journey of their own accord. 

28. The Bible commentator Scott supposes that angels were 
employed to aid in this business of storing away the animals 
in the ark ; but it is certainly derogatory to that elevated order 
of beings to suppose they would stoop to such groveling work 
;i- bug-hunting, skunk-catching, snake-snaring, &c. 

l".». And how could this immense multitude of respiring 
and perspiring animals live and breathe in a vessel with but 
one little twenty-two-inch window, and that in the third 



ABSURDITIES IN THE ARK AND FLOOD STORY. 93 

stor}^ and shut up most of the time to keep the rain out, espe- 
cially if some giraffe had been disposed to monopolize it when 
it was open by thrusting his head out ? How could they be 
kept thus for a whole year without breeding pestilence and 
death ? 

30. All animals require light ; and total darkness must have 
reigned in the two lower stories, and only a partial light sup- 
plied the third story, — just what could come through a twenty- 
two-inch window. 

31. The. chorus of voices in the ark — consisting of bellow- 
ing, baying, howling, screaming, hissing, neighing, snorting, 
roaring, chattering, buzzing, &c. — suggests that deafness 
would have been a blessing to the human beings present. 

32. We are told that u fifteen cubits upward did the water 
prevail, and the mountains were covered." Fifteen cubits 
(twenty-seven feet) would not cover nine-tenths of the build- 
ings now on the earth. Ararat is seventeen thousand feet, 
and Everest twenty-nine thousand feet high. 

33. Several scientists have shown by actual experiment that 
the atmosphere could not contain the fourteen-hundredth part 
of the water that is represented to have fallen in the time of 
the flood. 

34. Who or what conducted the ark to Ararat when the 
waters subsided? In the Brahminical flood story a fish is said 
to have performed this feat, and dragged it to Mt. Hinavat ; 
but Noah and Moses are silent on this point. 

35. The peak of Ararat is perpetually covered with snow and 
ice ; hence it must have been rather difficult and dangerous for 
the biped and quadruped cargo to descend from it. 

36. And what was there to prevent the nine hundred car- 
nivorous animals from devouring the sheep, hogs, poultry, rab- 
bits, minks, hedgehogs, &c, as they tumbled pell-mell down the 
mountain together. 

37. The same catastrophe must have ensued from the act 
of turning them loose upon the earth together, with nothing to 
subsist upon but the flesh and blood of each other. 

38. Man}^ Oriental nations have traditions of a flood, and 
some of them of several floods. Xisuthrus of Chaldea built a 



94 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

ship, in which he saved himself and family during a mighty flood 
which overflowed the world ; also Fohi of China, Menu of the 
Brahmins, Satravarata of India, and Deucalion of Greece. 
Hence it appears there were several families saved besides that 
of Noah's. Eg}^pt and India have stories of two floods occur- 
ring at different periods, — one ninety-five hundred years ago. 
All these stories are evidently older than that recorded in the 
Christian Bible. 

39. Geologists and archaeologists have collected a whole vol- 
ume of evidence, which shows that such a deluge could never 
have taken place as is embodied in the traditions of several 
nations. The fresh water of the lakes, and the salt water of the 
seas and oceans, would have been so mixed as never again to 
be separated as they are now. Egyptian monuments and sculp- 
ture can be traced to a much earlier period than that assigned 
for Noah's flood. 

40. Lepsius has traced the existence of several races or tribes 
of negroes up to a period within forty-eight years of Noah's 
flood ; this would seem to indicate that some of Noah's family 
were negroes, and must have "multiplied and replenished" 
very rapidly to start several races in forty-eight years. 

41. The dynasties of Eg} T ptian kings can be traced back 
several thousand years beyond Noah's time. 

42. It is true Jesus Christ and the apostles indorsed the 
truth of the flood story (Matt. xxiv. 37) ; but that is evidence 
against their intelligence, instead of being a proof of the truth 
of the stoiy. 

43. And the assumed divine author of the flood admitted it 
was an utter failure, — that it entirely failed to accomplish the 
cud intended; for it was declared but a few centuries after, 
11 liit "the imagination of man's heart is evil, and onl} T evil, 
continually," which is an evidence that the wicked folks were 
not all drowned by the world's inundation. 

11. With reaped to the many difficulties and impossibilities 
I have enumerated as lying in the way of carrying out this 
experiment of the flood, it is sometimes argued in defense, 
that, as the whole thing- was in the hands of GrOd, such 
obstacles would not be a straw in his way. But such persons 



ABSURDITIES IN THE ARK AND FLOOD STORY. 95 

have failed to notice that it is nowhere stated or implied that 
it was to be accomplished by miracles. A miracle could have 
destroyed all the wicked inhabitants of the earth in a moment, 
without any flood or other means. 

45. With regard to its being only a partial deluge, as argued 
by some Bible defenders, we will say that it is only necessary 
to examine the language of the Bible to settle this matter. It 
is declared over and over again, that the whole earth was cov- 
ered with water, and every living thing destroyed. If it had 
been only a partial deluge, all that would have been necessary 
for Noah to do to save himself and family would have been to 
migrate to some dry country ; and the doomed sinners might 
have saved themselves in this way. 

46. I will note here that the rainbow was for more than a 
thousand years looked upon both as evidence that there had 
been a universal deluge, and also that there never would be 
another. .It is only at a recent period that the study of philoso- 
phy has disclosed the fact that the rainbow is caused by the 
reflection and refraction of the rays of light upon the falling 
rain, and the error thus exploded. 

47. One thing in connection with this flood story is not clear- 
ly explained in the Bible : Methuselah's time was not out till 
ten months after the flood began, according to Bible chronology. 
Where was he during this ten months ? 



96 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, MORAL DEFECTS OF. 

These commandments have alwa}^s been regarded by Bible 
believers as being a remarkable display of infinite wisdom, and 
as being morally perfect beyond criticism ; and consequently 
they have passed from age to age without examination, when a 
little investigation would have shown any logical mind that they 
contain palpable errors both in logic and morals. 

First commandment: " Thou shalt have no other Gods be- 
fore me " (Exod. xx. 3) ; that is, as commentators have in- 
terpreted it, "Thou shalt prefer no Gods to me." And why 
not? What harm can it do? Supposing the people prefer a 
golden calf, as the Jews did under the leadership of Aaron, 
in the name of reason how can it injure either God or man? 
if not, where is the objection? The feeling of devotion is the 
same in all cases, whatever may be the object worshiped. 
Hence the worshiper is as much benefited b} T worshiping one 
object as another. On the other hand, it would be a slander 
upon infinite wisdom to suppose he can desire the homage, adora- 
tion, and flatter}" of poor ignorant mortals, and desire them 
to crouch at his feet. It would make a mere coxcomb of him 
to suppose he can be pleased with such adulation, or that he 
desires such homage. We worship no such God. 

Second commandment. The second commandment prohibits 
our making " the likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, 
the earth beneath, or the waters under the earth " (Exod. xx. 4). 
Let us look, in the first place, at the effect of this prohibition, 
and then at the character of the act. It effectually cuts off the 
086 of photographs, portraits, and pictures, — illustrations of 
every description ; for all these are likenesses of something. 



THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. 97 

Hence thousands of cases of the violation of this command- 
ment take place every day in all Christian or civilized countries. 
Books are issued every day containing likenesses of something 
in the heavens above or the earth beneath ; especially, are school- 
books illustrated with the likenesses of all kinds of living beings, 
and often with inanimate objects, bj r which children learn. The 
second commandment is utterly disregarded and trampled under 
foot by all Christendom. 

Third commandment. This commandment prohibits our 
bowing down to and worshiping any other God but Jehovah, 
because " I, the Lord thy God, am a jealous God " (Exod. xx. 5) . 
As for ".jealousy," it will make any being hateful and despised, 
according to William Penn. But why not worship other Gods 
(that is, beings supposed to represent or resemble God) ? Can 
any serious evil result from such an act, either to God or his 
worshipers? If so, what is it? Let us assume, for the sake 
of the argument, that the heathen who bow down to images of 
wood and stone suppose them to be the veritable living and true 
God (which, however, is not true) , yet it would be the very 
climax of folly to suppose that an infinite being, of such infinite 
perfection that it places him at an infinite distance beyond hu- 
man flattery, can take the slightest offense at such an act. It 
is childish to entertain such a thought. A thousand times more 
sensible is the doctrine of the Hindoos' Vedas, which makes God 
(Brahma) say, " Those who worship other Gods worship me, 
because I hear them, and correct their mistake." We will illus- 
trate : — 

A rebel soldier (son of a doctor) was wounded near his father's 
house, in Kentucky, during the war, in which he immediately 
sought refuge. As he entered the hall (it being evening twi- 
light) , he observed some person at the farther end whom he 
supposed to be his father, and exclaimed, "Father, I am 
wounded! Can you aid me?" His father, being in a room 
above, overheard him, and responded, " Yes, sir." Had he had 
the vanity of Jehovah, he should have replied, " No, sir: you 
mistook the servant in the hall for me : therefore I will not 
assist you, but punish you, and kill you." Remember, Jeho- 
vah is represented as killing the worshipers of other Gods 



98 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

(Deut. xiii. 6). If an illiterate heathen in like manner should, 
in his ignorance, call upon idols or mere imaginary beings for 
aid, would not his heavenly Father, u in the room above" or 
the heaven above, hear him and reply, " You are mistaken; I 
am here, not there ; but no difference, the mistake is not im- 
portant : your intention was good, and your motives honest ; 
therefore I will grant your request " ? This would be sensible. 
But Jehovah is represented as saying, " If thy brother or son 
or daughter, or even the wife of thy bosom, shall say, let us 
go and serve other Gods, thou shalt not pity nor spare, but 
kill them" (Deut. xiii. 6). Here is the most shocking cruelty, 
combined with supreme nonsense. We are commanded to kill 
wives, sons, and daughters, if they entertain a different view of 
God from ours, no matter how honest they may be ; and there 
is no question but that all worshipers are honest. They can not 
be otherwise. And yet there is no sin more frequently or more 
fearfully denounced in the Christian Bible than that of worship- 
ing other Gods. Who can not see that it all grew out of the 
bitter sectarian bigotry of the Jews, which engendered feelings 
of animosity toward all nations who refused to subscribe to their 
creed? This has been the fault of all creed worshipers. As 
" no man hath seen God at any time " (John i. 18) , it must be a 
matter of imagination with every human being as to what is the 
form, size, and character of God. And therefore it can make 
no difference what God, or what kind of God, we call upon in 
our prayers. We would be equally heard and answered, if there 
were a God answering prayer. The third commandment, there- 
lore, is devoid of sound sense. 

Fourth commandment: "Thou shalt not take the name of 
the Lord thy God in vain" (Exod. xx. 7). The word " vain" is 
defined to mean " worthless, fruitless ; " that is, attended with 
no good results. And we can not conceive that it can be any 
more sinful to take the name of God in vain than that of a 
human being, or of any other object. It is not rational to sup- 
• God, while superintending the movements of eighty-live 
millions of worlds, pays any attention to the manner in which 
the inhabitants of this little planet use his name, or that he 
$9 anything about it. And then how is it possible for us 



THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. 99 

to know when we are using his name in vain, and when we are 
not? 

Fifth commandment: " Eemember the sabbath day to keep 
it holy." This commandment is universally laid aside b}^ all 
Christendom. Nobody keeps the sabbath but the Jews. And 
as God himself does not keep the sabbath, but lets all nature 
run and work (her laws operate the same on that da}' as on all 
other days of the week) , we can not believe the sabbath was 
instituted by him. 

Sixth commandment : " Honor thy father and mother " (Exod. 
xx. 12). Pretty good ; but the reason assigned for it is devoid 
of sense, — " That thy days may be long upon the earth." We 
have never learned that long-lived persons have been more duti- 
ful to parents than others. 

Seventh commandment: " Thou shalt not kill" (Exod. xx. 
13) . If the word " not " were left out, we would concede this 
commandment has been faithfully obeyed. His " holy people " 
were killing nearly all the time ; and their successors (the Chris- 
tians) have inundated the earth with blood by a constant viola- 
tion of this command. What good, therefore, we would ask, 
has resulted from this commandment ? 

Tenth commandment. The tenth commandment forbids us 
to covet our neighbor's house, wife, or servant, or any of his 
property (covet, u to desire earnestly ") . We can not conceive 
how there can be any moral turpitude in the act of desiring to 
possess any of our neighbor's property, or even his wife, if no 
improper means are used to obtain them. The command was 
doubtless issued to keep the poor man from aping the rich, and 
to make him content with his own lot and condition. 

The above will be understood to be the true exposition of 
u the hoi}' commandments of the Lord," " the ten glorious 
laws of God," when people become accustomed to use their 
reason in matters of religion. 



100 TEE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

FOOLISH BIBLE STOBIES. 

I. Talking Serpents and Talking Asses. — Gen. hi., 
Num. xxii. 

The laws of nature appear to have possessed but little force, 
permanency, or reliability in the clays of Moses, as they were 
often brought to a dead halt, and set aside on the most trivial 
occasions, according to Bible history ; and nothing could be 
learned of the character, habits, or natural powers of animals 
by their form or physical conformation, if they possessed, as 
represented, minds and reasoning powers supposed to be pe- 
culiar to the human species. Hence the study of natural history 
must have been useless. When naturalists at the present day 
find animals without the organs of speech, they assume they do 
not possess the ability to talk and reason. But the absence of 
the vocal organs in the days of Moses appears to have furnished 
no criterion, and interposed no obstacle to becoming a fluent 
speaker and an able reasoner, as is illustrated in the case of a 
serpent and an ass talking and arguing like a law}*er. Hence 
natural history could have possessed no attraction, as nothing 
certain could have been learned by studying it. 

1. It is a singular reflection that the Christian plan of salva- 
tion is based on a serpent, and with about as little show of sense 
as the Hottentot tradition of the earth resting on the heads of 
four turtles. 

2. The i<ha of God creating a serpent to thwart and defeat 
his plans and designs, or permitting him to do it, is absolutely 
ridiculous. 

:>. [f God knew, when he created the serpent, that his machi- 
lOns would bring tc death and sin and all our woe " into the 
world, the act would prove him to be an unprincipled being. 



FOOLISH BIBLE STOBIES. 101 

4. And, if he did not know it, he must have been ignorant 
and short-sighted, and not fit to be a God. 

5. It would imply that he made a wonderful mistake in creat- 
ing a being that "turned right round," and made war on his 
own kingdom, crippled it, and defeated its success. 

6. To assume that God could be outwitted by a serpent is to 
place him lower in the scale of intelligence than a snake. 

7. It would seem that the serpent was superior to Jehovah 
either in knowledge or veracity ; for his statement relative to 
the effect of eating the fruit proved to be true, while that of 
Jehovah proved to be false (Gen. iii. 3) . 

8. And, as we have shown in chapter liii, he was a greater 
friend and benefactor to the human race than Jehovah, as a 
number of benefits and blessings were conferred upon Adam 
and Eve and their posterity by yielding to his advice instead of 
obeying the mandates of Jehovah. 

9. It would doubtless be a source of gratification to natural- 
ists of the present age to learn what species of snake that was 
which possessed such a remarkable intellect and reasoning facul- 
ties and powers of speech ; and also whether Hebrew was its 
vernacular. 

10. Why is it that ladies of the present day possess none of 
the nerveless intrepidity and moral courage of old mother Eve, 
who could stand and listen to a serpent talking without any 
signs of fainting, and with a perfect nonchalance, when our 
modern ladies would probably scream or run if a snake they 
should meet should assume the liberty to address them even in 
the most polite manner? Mother Eve must have been familiar 
with oddities. 

11. If serpents and asses could talk in the days of Moses, 
why not now ? Why have the}' lost the power of speech ? 

12. The species of serpents and asses which furnished such 
distinguished reasoners and orators should have been preserved, 
both as natural curiosities and on account of their practical 
benefits. It would be a source of instruction as well as amuse- 
ment for a traveler, while journeying astride the back of an 
ass, to be able to enter into a friendly chitchat and exchange 
views with him, especially if the ass should be well posted on 
the topics of the day. 



102 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

13. It seems singular that the heathen prophet Balaam should 
be able to enlighten infinite wisdom when he called on him for 
information concerning Balak, King of Moab, or that he should 
have been better posted in the matter. 

14. The circumstance of Jehovah advising Balaam to go at 
the call of Balak to curse Israel, then becoming very angry at 
him because he did go, and employing an ass to intercept his 
journey, evinces him to have been a fickle-minded and change- 
able being. (Num. xxii. 20, 22.) 

15. It appears that, with all of Balaam's superior intelli- 
gence, he was inferior in spiritual discernment to that of his ass, 
as she could see the spirit standing in the road when he could 
not. 

16. It has been contemptuously suggested as a slur on spirit- 
ualism, that perhaps the ass was a spiritual medium. But the 
fact that asses (of the biped species) can now be found endowed 
with the power of speech, renders the conclusion more rational 
that the ass talked without the aid of a spirit. 

Such are some of the ridiculous features of these ridiculous 
stories. The expedient of disposing of these foolish stories as 
allegories, as some have attempted, will not avail any thing : 
for such figures are too low and groveling to be employed even 
as metaphors ; and there is no hint in the Bible that they are to 
be understood in an allegorical or metaphorical sense 

II. The Story of Cain, Absurdities of. 

1. Did not Eve dishonor God when, at the birth of Cain, she 
said, "I have got a man from the Lord" (Gen. iv. 1), inas- 
much as he turned out to be a murderer? 

2. Did not God know that Cain would become a murderer? 
If he did not, he is not an omniscient God. 

3. And. if he did know it, would it not make him accountable 
for the murder? 

1. Why did God set a mark on Cain that " whosoever should 
find him should not slay him" (Gen. iv. 15), when there was 
no *• whosoever" in existence but his father and mother? And 
it can not be supposed they would have to hunt to find him, 
or that they would kill him when found. 



FOOLISH BIBLE STORIES. 103 

5. And how could " whosoever " know what the mark meant? 

6. Where did or where could Cain have gone when he " fled 
from the presence of the Lord" (Gen. iv. 16), as David says 
he is present eveiywhere, even in hell? 

7. How could Cain find a wife in the land of Nod (see Gen. 
iv. 17), when he himself had killed the whole human race ex- 
cepting his father and mother ? There were then no women to 
make wives of. 

8. Why did Cain build a city (see Gen. iv. 17), when there 
was nobody to inhabit it? 

9 . As there were ' 4 workers of iron and brass ' ' in this city, 
does it not furnish evidence that there was a race of people who 
had attained a high state of civilization before Adam was 
made ? 

10. And as brass is not an ore, but a compound of copper 
and zinc, does it not furnish evidence that the mining business 
and the mechanic arts were carried on long before Adam's 
time? 

11. If Cain did find a wife in the land of Nod, is it not evi- 
dence that some ribs had been converted into women before 
Adam's time? 

12. Where did Cain find carpenters and masons to build his 
city, if his father and mother constituted the whole human race? 

13. Did not Jehovah know, when he accepted Abel's offering 
and rejected Cain's, that he was sowing the seeds of discord 
that would lead to murder ? 

14. And did he not set a bad example by showing partiality, 
as there is no reason assigned for preferring Abel's offering? 

15. Had not Cain just ground for believing that his offering 
of herbs would be accepted, inasmuch as Jehovah had ordered 
Adam to use herbs for food ? 

16. Must we conclude that Jehovah had a carnivorous appe- 
tite, which caused him to prefer animals to vegetables for sac- 
rifices ? 

17. What sense was there in dooming Cain to be a vagabond 
among men, when there was but one man in the world, and that 
his father ? 



104 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

III. The Ark of the Covenant, Absurdities of. — 1 Sam. 

CHAP. VI. 

We find no case in any history of superstition reaching a 
more exalted climax than that illustrated in the history of the 
Jewish ark of the covenant. It appears that up to the time of 
Solomon the Jews had no temple for their God to dwell in, but 
for some time previous hauled him about in a box, about four 
feet long b} T thirty inches deep, known as the u ark of the cov- 
enant." Let it not be supposed that we misrepresent in saying 
that Jehovah was supposed to dwell in this box ; for it is ex- 
plicith^ stated that he dwelt between the cherubims, which consti- 
tuted a part of the accoutrements of the ark. (See 1 Sam. iv. 
4.) One of the most singular and ridiculous features connected 
with this story is, that Jehovah, in giving instructions for the 
construction of the ark, told the people they must offer, among 
other curious things, badger-skins, goat's hair, and red ram's 
skins (i.e., ram's skins dj'ed red). What use God Almighty 
could have had for the hides and hair of these dead animals is 
hard to conjecture. Could superstition descend lower than this ? 
As minute a description is given of the whole affair by Jehovah 
and Moses as if there were some sense in it. The box was 
hauled about b} r two cows ; and it was enjoined that those se- 
lected by the Philistines should be cows that had never been 
worked or harnessed, and that their calves should be shut up 
and left at home. This is descending to a " bill of particulars." 
The calves must have suffered, as their dams were driven far 
away, and then slaughtered. What became of the calves is not 
staled : but we are told that the cows kept up a continual bel- 
lowing, or tc lowing." Perhaps this was designed as a kind of 
base or tenor for the music which accompanied them; and this 
accounts for the calves being left at home. It is curious to 
rye that the cows were not yoked to the cart on which the 
ark was drawn, but tied to it, — probably by their tails. The 
Jews did not seem to possess sufficient mechanical skill or 
ins to invent an ox-yoke. Another singular part of this 
rular story is, that the Philistines constructed six golden 
mice to accompany the ark; and yet we are told that the Jews 



FOOLISH BIBLE STORIES. 105 

were not allowed to have images of any thing (Ex. xx. 4) . The 
most serious consideration connected with this affair was the vast 
destruction of human life. In the first place the Philistines, in a 
battle with the Lord's people, slew thirty thousand of them, and 
captured this box, as we must presume, with the Lord in it. It 
seems strange that, when Jehovah had fought so many success- 
ful battles, he would allow himself to be captured. It was some 
time, too, before he was recovered from the Philistines. When 
this was effected, as the ark was being conveyed back under the 
superintendence of David, with a company of thirty thousand 
people, while passing over some rough ground, the cart jostled, 
and the ark came near being thrown off, with the Lord Jehovah 
in it, who would probably have been considerably bruised by 
the fall. But a very clever man by the name of Uzzah clapped 
his hand upon the cart to prevent this awful catastrophe ; and, 
although probably actuated by the best and most pious motives, 
he was immediately killed for it. This part of the story has a 
bad moral. On another occasion, on the arrival of the ark at 
Bethshemesh, because one or two persons attempted to gratify 
a very natural curiosity by looking into the ark, Jehovah became 
so much enraged that he killed fifty thousand of the people of 
Bethshemesh. Here is another of the many cases in which 
thousands of innocent people were punished for the sin of one 
man or a few persons. How can any good grow out of the 
relation of such unjust, unprincipled, and superstitious doings 
recorded in a book designed for the moral instruction and sal- 
vation of the world ? We are told that at every place to which 
this box was carried, while in the hands of the Philistines, it 
caused death and destruction, or some other serious calamity. 
At Ashdod it produced disease and destruction among the people 
to an alarming extent ; and similar results followed while the 
ark was at Ekron. Assuming that there is any truth in the 
story, the thought is here suggested that the box might have 
been 'affected with some malarious disease. While at Dagon it 
caused the God of that place to fall down in the night from his 
resting-place ; on the second night he lost both his hands. 
Who that is acquainted with Jewish history can not see that this 
circumstance is related to show that the God of the Jews was 



106 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

superior to other Gods, as he excelled them in working miracles 
in Eg}^ and other places ? That it was a borrowed tradition 
is quite evident from the fact that the Hindoos and Egj^ptians 
had practiced similar rites and customs anterior to that period. 
The Hindoo ark was carried on a pole b} r four priests ; and, 
wherever it touched ground, it wrought miracles in the shape of 
deaths and births, or the outgushing of springs of water. The 
Egyptian ark was constructed of gold, which probably made 
the box more valuable than the God within. All such wooden 
or metal Gods were supposed to operate as a talisman, or pro- 
tection against evil. When will the believers in divine revela- 
tion and dime prodigies learn that all such superstitious customs 
and inventions were the work of men, and not of God? 

IV. Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, Absurdities. — Num. 

chap. XVI. 
These three leading men of Israel, growing tired of the tyran- 
nical usurpations of Moses, concocted a mutiny, in which they 
succeeded in enlisting some two hundred and fifty persons. 
When Moses learned what was on foot, this "meek man" 
became very angry, and reported the case to Jehovah, and re- 
quested him not to accept their offering when the}' came to make 
their usual oblations.' The Lord took Moses' advice, and not 
only refused their offering, but split the ground open where they 
stood, so that the}' fell in, and were seen no more. And, when 
their two hundred and fifty followers saw this, they fled, fearing 
they might share the same fate. But that expedient did not 
save them : " a fire came out from the Lord," and consumed the 
whole number. It must have been a fearful fire to consume so 
many while they were running. The fire came from the Lord ; 
but where the Lord was at the time we are not informed, — 
whether Bitting on his throne in heaven, or standing beside the 
altar, as he frequently did. Hence we can not tell whether the 
fire came from heaven, as it did on some other occasions, or 
from below. If must have been a very aggravated case of 
rebellion; for God and Moses both got angry at once, which 
was something rather unusual. It was customary, when Jeho- 
vah got angry and made severe threats of what he would do, 



FOOLISH BIBLE STORIES. 107 

for Moses to interfere, and intercede for his people, and try to 
cool him down ; and, by the power of his logic and eloquence, he 
mostly succeeded in convincing him that he was wrong, and got 
him to desist from carrying his threats into execution. But, on 
this occasion, Moses, being angry" ^*'f, let him take his own 
course. But the most unjust and u^^orciful act in the whole 
transaction was that of Jehovah sending a plague, and destroy- 
ing fourteen thousand more, merely because they mourned for 
their destroyed friends, and ventured to complain of the course 
he and Moses were pursuing. It was certainly cruel to destroy 
them for so slight an offense. It appears that, by Aaron's 
standing "between the dead and the living, the plague was 
stayed." But for this timely interference of Jehovah's high 
priest, there is no knowing when or where the plague would have 
stopped. Now, is it not something near akin to blasphemy to 
charge such nonsense — ay, worse than nonsense, cruelty , injus- 
tice, and malignity — to the just God of the universe? 

Y. The Story of Daniel and Nebuchadnezzar. 

We shall not attempt to present an exposition of all the 
absurdities which abound in the Book of Daniel, but will merely 
notice a few of its most incredible statements. The most 
amusing chapter in the histoiy of Daniel is his interpretation 
of the dreams of King Nebuchadnezzar. It appears that on 
one occasion the king had forgotten his dream, which made it 
ostensibly necessary for Daniel, before interpreting it, to repro- 
duce it. But who can not see it was not necessary for him to 
do either to save his reputation and his life, both of which it 
appears were at stake? If he were possessed of an active, 
fertile imagination, he could invent both, and palm them off on 
to the king as the original, who would be perfectly unable to 
detect the trick, as he knew nothing about either. It is stated 
that one of the dreams consigned the king to the fate of eating 
grass like an ox for three years. In all such incredible stories 
which abound in the Christians' Bible, we find glaring absurdities, 
which a little reflection would reveal to the reader if he would 
allow himself to think. There is a palpable absurdity in this 
story which shows that the conversion of the king into an ox 



108 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

as a punishment could not have achieved that end. If he were 
converted into an ox, his reason was gone, and he was uncon- 
scious of his condition ; and hence it was no punishment at all. 
Or, if he still retained his reason, he had nothing to do but to walk 
away, and find food mo:-' * ^enial to his appetite than grass. 
And thus the story defeats itself. It is stated his hair became 
like eagles' feathers, and his nails like the claws of a bird 
(Dan. iv. 33) , — a very singular-looking ox surety. It would have 
been more appropriate to call such a being an eagle or a dragon. 
Such is the careless and disjointed manner in which all Bible 
stories are told, as if related by mere ignorant children. The 
most conclusive u knock-down argument" to the. truth of this 
storj T is found in the fact that no allusion to this astounding 
miracle can be found by an}^ of the historians of that or any 
other nation. Had the king been transformed into an ox, the 
history of his own nation (the Persians) would abound in allu- 
sions to the marvelous fact. Its silence on it settles the ques- 
tion. 

We will occup} 7 sufficient space to allude to one incident in 
the story of " the three holy children," which we find related in 
the Book of Daniel. It is stated that a being who looked " like 
the Son of God " was seen b} r the king walking in the furnace. 
To be sure ! We are quite curious to know how he found out 
how the Son of God looks. How long had he lived in heaven 
with him so as to become familiar with his countenance? What 
silly nonsense ! 

VI. Sodom and Gomorrah. 

Story of Sodom and Gomorrah. We are seemingly required 
by this story to believe that God keeps a manufactory of brim- 
stone in heaven; for we are told that " the Lord rained upon 
Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of 
heaven" ((Jen. xix.). If we credit this stoiy, we may infer 
that the Lord keeps a supply of the article on hand, perhaps to 
be let down occasionally to replenish the bottomless pit. 

The science of chemistry lias demonstrated within the present 
century that the air Is composed of nitrogen and ox}-gen; and 
it has also demonstrated that oxygen gas and sulphur or brim- 






FOOLISH BIBLE STORIES. 109 

stone, when brought into contact, are, with a moderate amount 
of heat, dissolved, united, and converted into oil of vitriol. 
Hence, if fire and brimstone rained from heaven in that climate, 
it is scientifically and chemically certain that the people were 
pelted with a shower of the oil of vitriol. 

One square mile of the earth's surface in that locality would 
be supplied with about thirteen thousand million pounds of oxygen. 
The requisite amount of brimstone to convert this into oil of 
vitriol would be about ten thousand million pounds, making in 
the whole twent} T -three thousand millions of pounds. 

This would have been sufficient to spoil all the Sunday gar- 
ments of the people, but could not have burned them up ; for 
cold oil will not burn, and the fire and brimstone would have 
been converted into oil long before they reached the earth, and 
become too cool for the heat to injure any thing. 

We are told that several cities were destroyed by this divine 
judgment. And pray how many cities could exist in a hot and 
arid desert, where there was not a drop of water that a human 
being could drink? 

VII. Tower of Babel. 

Of all the stories ever recorded in any book, disclosing on the 
part of the writer a profound ignorance of the sciences, — em- 
bracing, at least, astronomy, geography, and philosophy, — that 
of the Tower of Babel was probably never excelled. A brief 
enumeration of some of its absurdities will disclose this fact. 

1. We are told (in chap. xi. of Genesis), that, after God had 
discovered by some means that " the children of men" were 
building a city and a tower to reach to heaven, he " came down 
to see the city and the tower" (Gen. xi. 6). The statement 
that he c ' came down ' ' implies that he was a local being, and 
not the omnipotent and omnipresent God. 

2. If he were not already present, and had to travel and 
descend in order to be present, we should like to know what 
mode of travel he adopted. It appears from the story that, if 
he came down, he must have returned almost immediately, and 
descended a second time ; for, after this, he is represented as 
saying, " Go to, let us go down, and there confound their lan- 
guage" (Gen. xi. 7). 



110 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

3 . Who was this " us ? ' ' The use of this plural pronoun 
" us " implies that there were several Gods on hand. 

4. And, if he came down, who did he leave in his place? 
Must we assume there is a trinity of Gods ? But it would be 
superlative nonsense to assume that the three Gods could be one 
(as Christians claim) if one of them could leave the kingdom. 

5. How did the writer know that he or they talked in this 
manner, as he could not have been present in person to hear it ? 

6. In this same chapter the u inspired writer" tells us, " The 
whole earth was of one language and one speech " (Gen. xi. 1). 
In the preceding chapter there is a long list of different tongues, 
or languages, and nations ; and it is declared they were " divided 
in their lands, everyone after his tongue, families, and nations." 
How contradictory ! 

7. What a childish and ludicrous notion the writer entertained 
with respect to heaven when he cherished the belief that a tower 
could be erected to reach it ! 

8. According to St. Jerome the Tower of Babel was twenty 
thousand feet high. A Jewish writer says it was eighty thousand. 
In the first case it would be nearly four miles in height ; in the 
other, over fifteen miles, — nearly three times the height of the 
highest mountain on the globe ! No method has ever yet been 
discovered for elevating building materials to such a height. 

9. Taking St. Jerome as authority, the hod-carriers, in ascend- 
ing and descending, would have to perform a journey of more 
than seven miles each trip. 

10. As the air becomes rarefied in proportion to its distance 
from the earth, the lungs of the workmen would have collapsed, 
and their blood have congealed, before they climbed half-way to 
the top. They could not have breathed at such a height. 

11. As the earth is constantly revolving on its axis, the crazy 
tower-builders would only be in the direction of the point at 
which they aimed once in twenty-four hours, and then moving 
with ;i speed one hundred and forty times greater than that of a 
cannon-ball. It would require dexterous springing to leap into 
the door of heaven as they passed it. 

12. And as the earth, in its orbit, moves at the rate of sixty- 
eight thousand miles an hour, it would soon carry them millions 
of miles beyond any point they might be aiming to reach. 



FOOLISH BIBLE STOBIES. Ill 

13. After all, we can not see any possible objection Jehovah 
or any other God could have had to such an enterprise. 

14. If the Babelites had succeeded in climbing into heaven, 
what of it? AVas Omnipotence afraid they would dispossess 
him of his throne, and seize the reins of government? If not, 
what could have been the objection ? 

15. And then it would not have taken the " heavenly host " 
fifteen minutes to tumble them out, as they did Michael and the 
dragon. 

16. The truth is, the imaginary God of the Jews was a sus- 
picious, cowardly, and jealous being. He was constant^ getting 
into hot water. He appeared to live in perpetual fear day and 
night that some other God, or some of his own creatures, 
would encroach upon his rights. In this case he seemed to be 
alarmed for fear those ignorant, deluded tower-builders and wild 
fanatics would succeed in reaching the heavenly home, perhaps 
bind him, and cast him out of his own kingdom. What super- 
lative nonsense is the whole stor}^ ! And yet millions believe it 
to be divinely inspired, and many thousands of dollars have 
been spent in printing it, and circulating it over the world. 

VIII. Stopping the Sun and Moon, — Absurdities of the 

Story. 

Of all the stories that ever taxed the brain or credulity of a 
man of science, that of Joshua stopping the sun and moon 
stands pre-eminent. Think of bringing to a stand-still that 
magnificent and immense luminary which constitutes the center 
of a solar system of one hundred and thirty worlds, all of which 
move in harmony with it. Such a catastrophe would have 
broken one hundred and thirty planets loose from their orbits, 
and dashed them together in utter confusion, and would thus 
have broken up our solar system. The shock produced upon 
this earth would have thrown every thing on its surface off into 
boundless space. 

For a puny man, on a little planet like this, to command the 
mighty sun, which is fourteen hundred thousand times as large 
as the earth, to stop in its grand career, would be comparable 
to an ant saying to a mountain, " Get out of my way." 



112 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

And, when we look at the cruel and wicked purpose for which 
this stupendous miracle is said to have been wrought, we are 
shocked at the demoralizing effect such lessons must have upon 
the millions who look upon it as the work of a just and right- 
eous God. 

It savors too much of blasphemy to assume that a God of 
infinite justice would perform an act attended with such direful 
consequences, merely to allow the little, bloody-minded Joshua 
more time to blow out the brains and tear out the hearts of his 
enemies, guilty of no crime but that of believing in a different 
religious creed. Farewell to reason, justice, and morality, if 
we must subscribe to such moral lessons as this ! 

And why did he have the moon stopped at midday, when it 
could not be seen, and was, perhaps, on the opposite side of the 
globe? Egypt, India, Greece, and Mexico all have traditions 
of the sun stopping, but, in most cases, have too much sense 
to stop the moon. Fohi of China had the sun stopped eight 
hundred and fifty years before Joshua, the son of Nun, ever 
saw the sun. Bacchus and other God-men of Egypt had it 
stopped four times. While in Greece Phaethon was set after it 
to hurry it up, and increase its speed. A " poor rule that will 
not work both ways ! ' ' The Chinese annals state that the sun 
stopped ten days during the reign of the Emperor Yom. 
Argoon of India stopped it several days for his own accommo- 
dation. 

But, unfortunately for the cause of religion, or rather religious 
superstition, no man of science, in any of these countries, has 
as much as noticed these world-astounding phenomena ; and no 
writer, but one religious fanatic in each case, has spoken of 
them, — a circumstance of itself sufficient to render them ut- 
terly incredible. 

IX. The Story of Samson, — Its Absurdities. 
Were the story of Samson found in any other book than the 
Christian Bible, it would be looked upon by Bible believers as 
one of those wild and incredible Legends of heathen mythology 
with which all the holy books of that Bge abound. But it is 
accepted as true because found in the Bible; and the Bible is 



FOOLISH BIBLE STORIES. 113 

considered to be true, partly because it tells such marvelous 
stories. It is assumed that they prove each other. Perhaps it 
is upon the presumption that "it is a poor rule that will not 
work both wa}'s." 

1. We are told (Judg. chap, xiii.) that an angel appeared to 
the wife of Manoah, and promised her a son ; and Manoah 
seemed to be as well pleased about the matter as his wife, and 
seemed to care but little whether the father was a man or an 
angel or a God, and we are left in the dark as to which it 
was. 

2. It is rather a notable circumstance that the Jewish God and 
his angels seemed to have a great deal to do in trying to accom- 
modate and aid old women in becoming mothers, as in the 
case of Abraham's wife and Manoah' s wife, also Elizabeth 
and Mary in the New Testament, and other cases. 

3. The man or angel or God, whichever it was (for he is 
called by each name) , that appeared to Mrs. Manoah, advised 
her to abstain from strong drink, and to eat no unclean thing. 
Very good advice to be observed at any time ; but it seems to 
imply that she was in the habit of using such pernicious 
articles. 

4. And, when her child was born, he was called Samson, and 
was remarkable for his great strength, which is said to lie in 
his hair. The mighty denizens of the forest interposed no 
obstacle to his march ; and houses were but playthings, to be 
tossed in the air like balls. He is reported to have seized a 
Hon and slain him when yet a boy, without a weapon of any 
kind. It would have been well if this mighty hero had been 
present when Jehovah had a battle with the Canaanites (Judg. i. 
19), as he would not probably have been defeated so easily 
because they had chariots of iron. Those vehicles of iron 
would have been mere straws for Samson. If their respective 
histories be true, he excelled Jehovah, both with regard to 
strength and courage, in a severe contest. 

5. It is stated that, a short time after this 3'oung bachelor- 
hero had slain the king of the forest, as he was returning home 
from a visit to his lady-love, he observed that a swarm of bees 
had taken possession of the carcass, and filled it with honey. 



114 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Those bees must have been very much less fastidious in their 
tastes and habits than the bees of modern times ; for the latter 
shun a carcass as instinctively as death. 

6. Another remarkable circumstance connected with this case 
is, that the long-haired bachelor thrust his hands through the 
bees, and tore out the hone} 7 , regardless of their stinging mode 
of defending their rights. His skin must have been as remark- 
able for toughness as his muscles for strength. 

7. One of the most cruel, ungodly, and fiendish acts of this 
young hero was that of murdering thirty men to get their gar- 
ments, as a recompense to those thirty persons who solved his 
riddle ; thus massacring thirty innocent persons in order to 
strip them of their garments, — an unprovoked and wanton 
murder. And yet it is declared, u the spirit of God was with 
him." What shocking ideas of Deity ! 

8. Samson was evidently a " free-lover," as he had inter- 
course with a number of women of doubtful character. 

9 . His next great feat consisted in chasing and catching three 
hundred foxes, and tying their tails together, and making a fire- 
brand of them. It must have been a good time to raise poultry 
after so many foxes had disappeared, but certainly not before 
that event, if foxes were so numerous. 

10. It seems strange that these " tail-bearers " of fire did 
not take to the woods, instead of running through all the fields 
in the country, and setting them on fire. 

11. The next feat was the breaking of two strong cords, 
with which his arms had been bound by three thousand men. 
(Sec Judg. xv. 4). It is difficult to conceive how three thou- 
sand men could get to him to tic them, as it is intimated they 
did. His mode of being revenged after he had snapped the 
cords was to seize the jaw-bone of an ass, and sla}' a thousand 
men; and. after he had killed these thousand men with the 
bone, there was enough of it left to contain a considerable 
amount of water. It is related that the Lord clave a hollow in 
it. and there came out of it water to quench Samson's thirst. 

12. AjBsee seem to figure quite conspicuously in Bible history. 
Sometimes they talk and reason like a Cicero, as in the case of 
Balaam ; and they serve other important ends in the histories 



FOOLISH BIBLE STOBIES. 115 

of Abram and Job (who had a thousand) and Samson, and 
also that of Jesus Christ, who is represented as riding two at 
once. In the hands of Samson the jaw-bone of an ass was 
more destructive than a twenty-four pound cannon, besides fur- 
nishing him with water sufficient to supply his thirst. 

13. Another feat of this young Hercules was that of carrying 
away the gate and gate-posts of the city of Gaza, in which the 
keepers had shut him up while lodging with a harlot. Most of 
his female companions seem to have been licentious characters ; 
and yet 4i the Lord favored him " ! 

14. It is said u the spirit of the Lord moved Samson" 
(Judg. xiii. 25). It would seem that the spirit of the Devil 
did also ; for he had a terrible propensity for lying. He lied even 
to his own wife three or four times. He once deceived her by 
telling her that his strength could be overcome by tying him 
with green withes ; and yet he snapped them like cobwebs. He 
then virtually confessed to her that he had lied, but told her 
that new ropes would accomplish the thing ; and yet he was no 
sooner bound with them, than he freed his limbs as easily as a 
lion would crawl out of a fish-net. The next experiment in lying 
and tying appertained to his hair. He told his sweet Delilah, 
that, if she would weave his seven locks of hair into the web 
in the loom, he would be as weak as another man ; but he walked 
off with the web and the whole accouterments hanging to his 
head, as easily as a wolf would with a steel trap dangling to his 
foot. Why- did not the hair pull out by the roots? He then 
told her the truth, as was assumed, but which was evidently the 
biggest falsehood he had uttered, — that his strength lay in his 
haii^, and that his strength would depart if his hair were to be 
shorn off. But if there were any physical strength incorporated 
in the hair, so that it would flow into the brain and down into 
the muscles when wanted to be used, men would not frequent 
barber- shops, as they now do, but let it grow ten feet long if 
necessary. 

15. The last great act in this drama of physical prowess 
was that of overthrowing a house with three thousand people on 
the roof. (Modern architecture don't often produce a roof 
large enough or strong enough to sustain three thousand people. 



116 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

This feat would require more strength than to conquer the 
battalion armed with chariots of iron ! 

16. And in all this unholy and wicked business of lying, 
cheating, and murdering, " the Lord was with him." This is a 
slanderous imputation upon Divine Perfection and Holiness. 

17. No good that we can discover, but much evil, was accom- 
plished b} r the practical life of this extraordinary man. He 
was ostensibly raised up to redeem Israel ; and yet, immediately 
after his death, the Philistines gained a complete victor} 7 over 
the Israelites, and took prisoner the ark of the Lord, and re- 
duced them to a worse condition than they were in before. 

18. We can not escape the conviction that such stories have a 
demoralizing effect upon those who read them, and believe they 
have the divine approval. 

19. For seeming to treat the subject in a spirit of ridicule, I 
will cite a Christian writer as authority, who says, " He who 
treats absurdities with seriousness lowers his own dignity and 
manhood." 

20. Such stories as the foregoing can certainly do nothing 
toward improving the morals of the heathen by placing the 
book containing it in their hands. 

X. Story of Jonah, — Its Absurdities. 

The history of Jonah is so much like numerous stories we 
find in heathen mythology that we are disposed to class it 
with them. Its absurdities are numerous, a few of which we 
will point out : — 

1 . It represents Jonah as claiming to be a Hebrew ; but as 
it sa}'s nothing about the Jews or Hebrews, and treats entirely 
of the heathen or Gentiles, that is probabty its source, and it 
was perhaps intended as a fable. 

2. The ship he boarded, when making his escape, was a 
heathen vessel, which implies that he had some affinity for that 
class of people. 

3. It seems very singular, that if Jonah did not believe Jeho- 
vah to be a mere local personal deity, rather than the Infinite 
and Omnipresent God, he should entertain the thought of 
running away from him or escaping from his presence by flight. 






FOOLISH BIBLE STORIES. 117 

4. The heathen who had charge of the vessel were evidently 
possessed of more humanity and more mercy than either Jeho- 
vah or the leading nien of Israel, who seem to have made it a 
point to kill nearly all the heathen they could lay their hands 
on ; as did Abram, Moses, Joshua, &c. For it is stated, that 
after they had cast lots to find who was the cause of the storm 
which overtook the ship, and in this way discovered it was 
Jonah, they strove with all their might to get the vessel to the 
shore, rather than resort to the desperate expedient of throwing 
Jonah overboard. This bespeaks for these heathen a feeling of 
mercy and humanrty. 

5. We learn bj the language these heathen used in their 
prayer to stop the storm, "We beseech thee, O Lord," &c, 
that they believed in one supreme God. Where, then, is the 
truth of the claim of the Jews that they alone believed in one 
God, or the unity of the Godhead? In this way their own 
Bible often proves this claim was false ; that the nations they 
had intercourse with believed in one supreme and overruling 
God. 

6. It is stated, that after Jonah was thrown overboard, and 
was swallowed by a fish, he prayed to the Lord. How was 
this discovered ? Did he pray loud enough to be heard through 
the sides of the whale ? or did the fish open its mouth for his 
accommodation ? 

7. As for the prayer, it appears to have been made up of 
scraps selected from the Psalms of David without much con- 
nection, or relevanc} r to the case. 

8. It is stated that the Lord spake to the fish, and it vomited 
Jonah upon the dry land. It must have been a very singular 
fish to understand Hebrew or any human language. 

9. In another respect the whale must have been a peculiar 
one, or of peculiar construction. The throat of an ordinary 
whale is about the diameter of a man's arm. It must therefore 
have been very much stretched to swallow Jonah, or Jonah 
must have been very much compressed and elongated. 

10. The gourd that sheltered Jonah must also have been of a 
peculiar species to have a vine that could grow several }^ards in 
one night, and stand erect so as to hold the gourd in a position 



118 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

to shelter the prophet ; and the gourd would have to be as large 
as a cart or locomotive, or it would soon cease to afford him 
shade. 

11. Jonah seems to have been a very proud and selfish man, 
with but little of the feeling of mercy, as he preferred that the 
whole nation of Ninevites should be destroyed rather than that 
his prediction should not be fulfilled, for he became very angry 
when he found the Lord was going to spare them. 

12. The reason the Lord assigns for sparing Nineveh is a 
very sensible one, — because " there are more than threescore 
thousand persons that can not discern between their right and 
their left hand." This is certainly very good reasoning; but 
why did he not think of this when millions of innocent persons 
perished in the act of drowning the whole human race, except- 
ing four men and four women, or when Sodom and Gomorrah 
were swallowed up, or when seventy thousand were killed for a 
sin committed by David, or in the numerous cases in which a 
war of extermination was carried on against whole nations, 
with the order to slay men, women, and children, and " leave 
nothing alive that breathes ' ' ? Why such partiality ? But this 
is one of the two thousand Bible inconsistencies. 

13. This is a very poor story, with a very bad moral. It 
indicates fickleness, short-sightedness, and partiality on the part 
of Jehovah ; and selfishness and bad temper on the part of his 
prophet. 

14. There are other absurdities in this story which we will 
bring to view by a few brief questions. 

15. Why did Jehovah care any thing about the salvation or 
welfare of Nineveh, a heathen city, when usually, instead of 
laboring to save the heathen, he was plotting their destruction? 

1G. What put the thought into the heads of the mariners, that 
the storm was caused by the misconduct of some person on board? 
Can we suppose they ever knew of such a case? If the miscon- 
duct of human beings could produce storms or a disturbance of 
the elements, the world would be cursed by a perpetual hurri- 
cane. 

17. We arc told the sailors cast lots to ascertain who was the 
cause of the storm. Bather a strange way of investigating the 
cause of natural events. 



FOOLISH BIBLE STORIES. 119 

18. Is it not strange that Jehovah would bring on a violent 
storm on Jonah's account, and continue it for hours, and let him 
sleep during the time ; and still stranger that Jonah was so in- 
different that he could sleep in such a storm ? 

19. Jonah must have been the most considerate and merciful 
sinner ever reported in history to propose himself that he should 
be thrown overboard as a means of allaying the storm, and sav- 
ing a set of gambling heathen. What a wonderful freak of 
mercy and justice ! But it seems to have been all exhausted on 
the mariners, so that he had none left for the poor Ninevites ; 
for he became very angry when he found Jehovah was not 
going to destroy them, the innocent and guilty and all together. 
This was inconsistent, to say the least. 

20. What must have been the astonishment of the crew of the 
hundreds of ships sailing on the same sea to observe a sudden 
storm to arise and stop without any natural cause ! And when 
they afterwards learned that the whole thing was brought about 
by the misconduct of one man in one of the vessels, perhaps 
hundreds of miles distant, they must have abandoned all idea 
of ever looking again for natural causes for storms after that 
occurrence. How repressing such events would be to the 
growth and cultivation of the intellect, and the study of the 
natural sciences ! 

21. How could Jonah remain three days in the whale's 
stomach without being digested, as fish have astonishing 
digestive powers? And, if he were not digested, both he and 
the fish must have been extremely hungry at the end of the three 
days' fast. 

22. As a fish large enough to swallow Jonah could not swim 
through the shoal-water to reach the land, it becomes an inter- 
esting query to know how it got Jonah on to " the dry land." 
It must have required the use of a powerful emetic to inspire 
the fish with force sufficient to throw him fifty or a hundred feet. 

23. Is it not strange that Jonah's message to the Ninevites 
should have had such a marvelous effect upon the whole city, 
when it was evidently delivered in a language that none of them 
understood ? 

24. We are told the king issued orders for everybody, 



120 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

including men, women and children, and beasts, to stop eating 
and drinking, and to be covered with sackcloth. What sin 
can we suppose the beasts had committed that they must be 
doomed to starve, and be covered with sackcloth as an emblem 
of repentance ? It must have required an enormous amount of 
sackcloth to cover two millions of people, and probably as many 
domestic animals. Where it all came from, the Lord Jehovah 
only knows. And it seems singular that all of the animals 
should stand quietly while such an uncouth covering was thrown 
upon them. 

25. It is also difficult to comprehend why a nation of people, 
who probably never heard of Jehovah before, should all repent in 
sackcloth and ashes. It is the most effective missionar}^ work 
we have ever read of. In modern times it requires two hundred 
missionaries a whole century to make half that many converts. 

26. But the most conclusive argument against the truth of the 
story is found in the fact that it is falsified by the testimony of 
history. According to her history by Diodorus, Nineveh was 
destroyed by Arbaces sixteen 3 x ears before Jonah's time. 

27. I have noticed this senseless story at some length, because 
Christian writers have invested it with great importance, and be- 
cause it is indorsed by nearly all the New-Testament writers. 
Even Christ himself indorses it, and compares Jonah's case to 
his. Their extreme ignorance is evinced by the foregoing expo- 
sition. 

28. Several similar stories are found in heathen mythology, a 
few of which we will briefly sketch here. The Hindoo sacred 
book, the Purans, states that Chrishna was swallowed by a croco- 
dile, and, after remaining three days in its stomach, was thrown 
upon dry hind, much to his relief and also to that of the crocodile. 
A Grecian demi-God (Hercules), according to Gales, was 
swallowed by a dog, and remained in his stomach three days. 
But the story entitled to the premium is one preserved in the 
legends of some of the Eastern islanders. A man, for some 
misdemeanor on a voyage across the Indus, was thrown over- 
board, and swallowed by a shark; but, as the fish still followed 
the vessel, it was finally eanght, and search made for the man, 
when, to the surprise of the whole crew, he was found sitting 



BIBLE PROPHECIES NOT FULFILLED. 121 

bolt upright, pla} T ing the tune of " Old Hundred "ona fiddle he 
had in his possession when he went down the throat of the sea- 
monster. This was rather a pleasant way of putting in the 
time. Jonah, it appears, was not so fortunate as to have a fiddle 
in his possession while in the stomach of the whale. The fore- 
going ten stories, from that of the serpent to Jonah, have been 
for hundreds of } T ears printed by the thousand, struck off in 
almost every known human language, and sent off by ship-loads 
to almost every nation on the globe, to be placed in the hands of 
the heathen as being productions of Infinite Wisdom, the inspira- 
tions of an All-ivise God, and calculated to enlighten them and 
improve their morals. What sublime nonsense ! what egregious 
folly ! And what a deplorable and sorrowful mistake has been 
thus committed by the blinded disciples of the Christian faith ! 



CHAPTER XIX. 

BIBLE PROPHECIES NOT FULFILLED. 

Having devoted a chapter to this subject in " The World's 
Sixteen Crucified Saviors," we shall treat the subject but briefly 
in this work. The Old Testament has been thoroughly searched 
for prophecies, and more than a hundred texts selected, b}^ vari- 
ous Christian writers, and assumed to be prophetic of some 
future event. But a critical and impartial investigation of the 
subject will show that not one of them is, strictly speaking, a 
prophec} T ; but most of them refer to events either in the past, or 
events naturally suggested by the circumstances under which 
the writer was placed. And in many cases the text has no 
reference whatever to the event which Bible commentators 
assume they refer to. In treating the subject briefly, we will 
show, — 

1. That if one-fourth of the texts from Genesis to Revela- 
tion were prophecies, and it could be shown that every one of 
them has been fulfilled to the letter, it would not prove that there 
was any divine inspiration or divine aid in the matter ; because 



122 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

many facts show that prophecy, or the power to discover future 
events, is a natural, and not a supernatural, gift. 

2. Many cases are reported in history of the prediction of 
future events by pagan or heathen seers, and also by persons 
not claiming to be inspired nor even religious. I will cite a few 
cases : Josephine, wife of Napoleon, relates that she had all 
the important events of her future life pointed out to her by an 
ignorant, illiterate fortune-teller, long before they occurred ; 
such as her marriage, her unhappy life, and the death of her 
husband, — all of which was fulfilled to the letter. An astrologer 
predicted the great fire in London. Rousseau foretold the 
French Revolution. Cicero made a remarkable prophecy, which 
was realized in the discovery of America and the history of 
George Washington by consulting the Sib} T lline oracles. These, 
and man} T other cases that might be cited, furnish satisfactory 
evidence that the capacity for foretelling the occurrence of 
future events is a natural and inherent power of the human 
mind, and hence can do nothing toward proving the divine 
origin of any religion, or the divine illumination of any prophet. 
Therefore any further argument in the case would be superflu- 
ous. We will only briefly review a few of the Jewish prophe- 
cies (or texts assuming to be prophecies) to show that the Jew- 
ish nation occupied a lower moral plane, and possessed less of 
the gift of prophecy, than some of the contemporary heathen na- 
tions. Hence Christian writers are wrong in assuming that the 
Jews alone possessed this power, while they possessed it in a 
less degree than some of the Oriental prophets. Prophecies 
(assumed to be) relating to Babylon, relating to Damascus, re- 
lating to T}Te, relating to the dispersion of the Jews, relating 
to the advent of Christ, &c, have been quoted time and again 
by Christian writers and clergymen, and dwelt upon at great 
length in attempts to show their fulfillment, in order to deduce 
therefrom the argument and conclusion that the Jewish nation 
were divinely commissioned to furnish the world with a true sys- 
tem of religion and morals. But we are prepared to show that 
every our of these prophecies so called has utterly failed of 
any fulfillment in the sense that writers and preachers assume. 
As it would require a large work to treat this subject fully, we 



BIBLE PROPHECIES NOT FULFILLED. 123 

shall only briefly refer to one or two cases as samples of the 
whole. As Babylon and Tyre are the most frequently referred 
to, and are regarded as the strongest cases, our attention will be 
confined to them. Relative to Babylon, Isaiah says, " It shall 
not be dwelt in from generation to generation ; neither shall the 
Arabian pitch his tent there" (Isa. xiii. 19) : but he says, 
" It shall be inhabited by wild beasts of the desert and satyrs 
and dragons," — not one of which predictions has ever been real- 
ized. It is still inhabited, though its name has been changed to 
Hillah, which has now a population of about nine thousand. 
So far from the " Arabian not pitching his tent there," it is the 
very thing they have done, and are now doing daily . Mr. Lay- 
ard, who recently visited the place, says, in his work ("Nineveh 
and Babylon ") , "The Arab settlement showed the activity of a 
hive of bees." What a singular rebuff to Isaiah's prophecy, 
and also to that of Jeremiah, who sa} r s it should become a " per- 
petual desolation " (xxv. 12) , and that it should not be dwelt in 
b}^ man nor the son of man! (Jer. 1. 40.) Isaiah declared, 
" Her days shall not be prolonged " (Isa. xiii) . And thus the 
prophecies have all failed which refer to Babylon. Speaking of 
Tyre, Ezekiel says, it should be taken by Nebuchadnezzar, and 
trodden down by his chariots and horses ; and ' c thou shalt be 
built no more, and thou shalt never be found again." And yet 
TjTe never was destatyed by Nebuchadnezzar, nor b}~ any 
power ; and, although it has suffered like other Eastern cities, it is 
still a flourishing city with a population of about five thousand. 
St. Jerome spoke of it in the fourth century as being "the most 
noble and beautiful city in Phoenicia." And this was more than 
a thousand years after Ezekiel' s maledictions were pronounced 
against it, which declared it should be destroyed, and never be 
rebuilt. True, it has been partially destined several times, — 
and what ancient city has not ? — but it has been rebuilt as often. 
We have, then, before us two illustrative cases of the failures of 
Jewish prophecies pronounced against neighboring cities and 
kingdoms, probably prompted by a spirit of envy and animosity 
because they had either overruled the Jewish nation, and sub- 
jected it to their power, or outstripped it in temporal prosperity. 
The Jewish prophets were continually fulminating their thunders 



124 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

and curses upon those powers and principalities which had over- 
powered them, and held them in subjection. This was very 
natural ; and occasionally an unpropitious prediction may have 
been realized. But it is a remarkable fact, that more than forty 
disastrous events, which the Jewish prophets declared the Lord 
would inflict upon Egj^pt (the nation they so much contemned 
and envied because it held them in slavery for four hundred 
years) , have never been realized in the hislory or experience of 
that nation. Some of these cases are noticed in " The World's 
Sixteen Crucified Saviors," as also the prophecies and failures 
in regard to Damascus and other cities, to which the reader is 
referred for a further elucidation of this subject. 



CHAPTER XX. 

MIRACLES, ERRONEOUS BELIEF IN. 

Having treated the subject of miracles at some length in 
"The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors," we shall give it but 
a brief notice in this work, and will comprehend the whole thing 
in a few points. 

1 . The histor3 r of miraculous achievements hy Gods and men 
form a veiy large chapter in the ' ' inspired writings ' ' of nearly 
all the ancient religious S3^stems which have flourished in the 
world ; and to notice all these cases would require volumes enough 
to make a library. 

2. Almost the only evidence we have in any case of the actual 
performance of a miracle is the report of the writer who re- 
lates it. 

B. Bt» Chrysostom declares that "miracles arc not designed 
for men of sense, but on'y for sluggish minds. " It will be un- 
derstood, therefore, that what we write here on the subject will 
not be designed for persons of sense, but only for the ignorant 
and superstitious. 

1. Many things in the past which were set down as miracles 
are now known to he the result of natural causes; such as the 



ERRONEOUS BELIEF IN MIRACLES. 125 

rainbow, most cases of sickness, and, in fact, nearly every phe- 
nomenon of nature. And, as ever} 7 age develops new light on 
natural causes, it has made the list of miracles not already ex- 
plained so small, that we may reasonably conclude that they 
will all yet be explained and understood in this light, excepting 
those fabricated without an} 7 basis of truth. 

5. As God appears to have regulated every thing in the be- 
ginning by fixed laws, if he should break one of those laws by 
the performance of a miracle, it would throw every thing into 
chaos and confusion, and prove that he is not a God of order 
and stability. 

6. If God, as we are told, made every thing perfect, then the 
performance of a miracle must make them imperfect, or prove 
that they have always been imperfect. 

7. The performance of a miracle would prove that God is an 
imperfect being in not having ever} 7 thing regulated by the laws 
of nature. 

8. If the performance of miracles can authenticate the truth 
of one religion, then it must prove the truth of all religions ; for 
all report miracles of some kind, and furnish, in most cases, the 
same kind of evidence that these miracles were performed. 

9. There is not a miracle related in either the Old or New 
Testament that has not a parallel reported in the Bibles or 
sacred writings of the Orientals ; such as curing the halt and 
blind, raising the dead, crossing streams in a miraculous man- 
ner, &c. Many cases are reported of the Hindoo Savior and 
Son of Gocl, Chrishna, raising dead persons who had been 
drowned, murdered, or died a natural death. According to 
Tacitus, Vespasian performed a number of miraculous cures ; 
such as curing the lame, restoring sight to the blind, &c, just 
as is related of Jesus. According to Josephus, Alexander with 
his arary passed through the Sea of Pamphylia in the same mir- 
aculous manner that Moses did through the Red Sea. As 
Alexander's army was engaged in the work of human butchery, 
we may assume that, if God could have had any thing to do with 
it, he would have embraced the opportunity to drown them, and 
wash them all away. 

10. Jeivish Miracles. — The Jewish Talmud speaks of birds 



126 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

so large that they darkened the sun, and shut out the light of 
the sun from the earth. Probably they supposed, like Moses, 
that nearly all the earth was located between Dan and Beersheba. 
Another kind of bird was so tall, that, when walking in a river 
seventy feet deep, the water only reached its knees. This is a 
tall story ; but it should be remembered that it is related by the 
same people who tell us about sticks being converted into ser- 
pents, water into blood, dust into lice, &c, and a man (Sam- 
son) overturning a house with several thousand people in it, &c. 
Hence all these as stories are equally reliable or unreliable. 

11. Ma) horn eclan Miracles. — Mahomedans bear off the palm 
in miraculous prodigies. For instance, a cock is spoken of 
so large that the distance between its feet and head was five 
hundred da}V journe}^. What a pity Barnum could not obtain 
it ! Another example : an angel so large that the distance 
between his eyes was seventy thousand days' journey. The 
head of this tall ghost must have been among the planets. The 
earth would have been too small to furnish him with a seat ; and 
the attempt to use it for that purpose would probably have 
thrown it out of its orbit. 

12. Christian Miracles. — The early Christians seem to have 
had the whole miracle-making machinery of heaven under their 
control. Their miracles were prodigious and numerous. They 
claimed they could cast out devils, call the dead from their 
graves, and make ghosts walk about either end up. We are 
told that when a Mr. Huntingdon was reduced to great poverty 
and Buffering, and prayed for divine assistance, fishes came 
out of the water to him, and larks and leather breeches from 
heaven, to serve as food and clothing. It is difficult to conceive 
how leather breeches came to be stored in heaven. With these 
few specimens, selected at random, we will stop. They are too 
large even to excite onr marvelousness. The most ignorant 
and superstitious nations have always had the longest creeds 
and the tallest miracles. 

18. We have stated that the only evidence of the perform- 
ance of any miracle in most cases is the simple narration of it 
by the writer who records it. r l lie Roman Catholics, however, 
claim to have the testimony of thousands of reliable witnesses 
to attest to the performance of some extraordinary miracles 



ERRONEOUS BELIEF IN MIRACLES. 127 

which they have reported the history of; such as a picture 
of the Virgin Mary, hanging on the walls of the church, 
opening and shutting its eyes daily for six or seven months, 
which the}' declare was witnessed by sixty thousand people, in- 
cluding Pope, cardinals, bishops, &c, — leading men of the 
Church. 

14. There is as much evidence that Esculapius raised Hypo- 
litus from the dead (as related by the Roman historian Pausa- 
nias) , as that Elijah or Christ raised the dead ; as much evidence 
that the serpent's egg inclosed in gold (as related by Pliny in his 
" Arguinum Ovum") swam up stream when thrown into the 
river, as that Elisha raised an ax to the surface of the water by 
casting a stick into it (2 Kings vi. 6) ; as much evidence that 
Mahomet opened a fountain of water in the end of his little fin- 
ger, as that Samson found a spring of water in the jaw-bone of 
an ass ; as much evidence that Mahomet's camel talked to him, 
as that Balaam's ass was endowed with human speech ; and as 
much evidence that Esculapius cured the blind with spittle, as 
that Christ performed such cures. All stand upon a level ; all 
lack the proof. 

15. Here let it be noted that many of the miracles recorded 
in the Christian Bible are susceptible of an explanation upon 
natural principles ; such as the shadow going back on the dial 
of Ahaz, as the phenomenon has been witnessed in some of the 
Eastern countries of the shadows appearing to recede, when 
the sun is near the solstice, once in the forenoon and once in the 
afternoon. The story of the devils entering the hogs may be 
explained by assuming the devils Jto have been frogs ; for they 
are described as being like frogs. (See Rev. xvi. 13.) 

The resurrection of Lazarus may be explained by assuming 
him to have been in a state of coma, or trance ; for Christ once 
declared, " This sickness is not unto death, " but " he sleepeth" 
(John xi). The bloody sweat of Christ, and his transfigura- 
tion, can also be explained on natural principles; also Paul's 
conversion, and his miraculous cures with a handkerchief. Dr. 
Newton, the great healer, has cured hundreds of cases in a sim- 
ilar manner. And the time will come when all real occurrences, 
now called miracles, will be accounted for, and understood as 
the operation of natural causes. 



128 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES, 



CHAPTER XXI. 

EEKOBS OF THE BIBLE IN FACTS AND FIGURES. 

A spiritual or metaphorical interpretation, if allowable in 
any case, can not avail any thing towards either removing, 
explaining, or mitigating, in the least degree, the numerous 
palpable Bible errors represented by figures. " Figures never 
lie," and admit of no construction. The almost innumerable 
errors, therefore, of this character which abound in the Bible 
utterly and for ever prostrate it as a work possessing any 
authority, reliabilhy, or credibility in matters of history, science, 
or even theology. Bible writers, when they have occasion to 
refer to numbers which thej 7, are interested in making appear 
veiy large, seem to make almost a lawless use of figures. I 
will present some examples, stated in brief language, com- 
mencing with the Pentateuch. The author of these five books, 
in speaking of the genealogy, population, armies, &c, of his 
own tribe, makes use of figures which are not only incredible, 
but utterly impossible. The number of valiant fighting men, 
for example, among the Israelites, is frequently stated to be 
about six hundred thousand, and never less. (See Exod. xii. 
and xxxviii. ; Num. xxvi., &c.) This number, as Bishop 
Colenso demonstrates, reaches far beyond the utmost limits of 
truth. [f the regular army had been six hundred thousand, 
then the whole population (women and children included) could 
not have been less than two millions, — a number which many 
fact-, cited by the Bible writer himself, demonstrate to be im- 
possible. I would ask, in the first place, how Moses could 
address all this immense congregation at once, as he is often 
represented as doing. (Sec Ex. xxiv. 3; Lev. xxiv. 15; 
Num. xiv. 7, *C.) Joshua makes " all the congregation" to 



EBBOBS OF THE BIBLE. 129 

include women and children. But how could Moses address 
this vast multitude of people, some of whom must have been at 
least ten miles distant, unless he used a speaking-trumpet or a 
telephone, neither of which, however, had then come to light? 
The writer of Deuteronomy says, " Moses spake unto all Israel" 
(Deut. i. 1). But not one in a hundred could have heard it: 
therefore it was very nearly " labor lost." And Joshua says 
Moses wrote out his commandments, and he read them " before 
all the congregation of Israel" (Josh. viii. 35). But it would 
have required a voice as loud as thunder to make 4 ' all ' ' of 
them hear. And it should be borne in mind that the people 
on these occasions were assembled in the tabernacle, — as we 
infer from many texts, — a building one hundred and eight }^ards 
square, and capable of holding about five thousand people, 
which would be just one to four thousand of the congregation ; 
so there were five thousand people inside, and one million nine 
hundred and ninety-five thousand outside. These last, we are 
told, occupied the outer court, which was just eighteen feet wide. 
This would place the most distant hearers twenty miles off. 
How comforting the thought, that, when Moses called them to 
the temple to worship (see Josh. viii. 35), they could get within 
twenty miles of him and "the tabernacle of the Lord " ! The 
Lord had built a tabernacle for them to worship in, but only one 
or two in six thousand could get inside of it. This small num- 
ber only could enjoy seeing and hearing Moses and the Lord. 
The rest — one million nine hundred and ninety-five thousand — 
were outside, waiting for admission. Bishop Colenso estimates 
the size of the camp of Israel at about twelve miles square. 
This camp was situated in a desert of Sinai for at least a 3-ear ; 
and the business of keeping this camp in order, waiting upon 
the people, and removing also, the remains of the daily sacrifice 
of two hundred thousand oxen, sheep, &c, devolved upon three 
priests, — Aaron, Eleazar, and Ithamar. It would be quite an 
improvement of the sacerdotal order if the priests of to-day 
could be subjected occasionally to some such healthy exercise ; 
but they have managed to get the rule reversed. The}^ now 
have the people to wait upon them. But those three priests of 
the Israelites must have achieved a herculean task to wait each 



130 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

one upon three hundred and thirty-three thousand people daily, 
and, after preparing their food outside the camp, travel twelve 
miles to supply each one of this vast multitude with food and 
water. If they carried provision for only one person at a time, 
they would have had to perform this journey of twelve miles 
five thousand five hundred times an hour, which would have 
required them to be rather fleet on foot. And, besides the 
labor of carrying away every da} 7 , to the distance of six or seven 
miles, five hundred cart-loads of the offal of the dead animals, 
there would be at least one pound of victuals to be carried to 
each person, making, in the aggregate, five thousand five hun- 
dred pounds. They must have enjoyed good health, if abun- 
dant exercise would produce it. They could not have been 
much troubled with dyspepsia or liver- complaint, as many of 
that order are nowadays. 

1 . We are told that Moses gave notice to the children of 
Israel at midnight, that they must take their departure from 
Egj'pt the next morning for the promised land (Exod. xii.) ; 
but, if they constituted the immense number represented, they 
would have made a column two hundred miles long, arranging 
them five abreast, so it would have taken several days for all to 
get started. How, then, could they all start the next morning ? 
And how did they keep their two millions of sheep and cattle 
alive for several days while passing over a sandy desert too 
poor to produce dog-fennel ? And it is strange how the whole 
tribe of Israelites, if two millions in number, could live forty 
years in a wild, barren desert, and keep their immense flocks 
and herds alive. 

2. The number of first-born male children over a month old, 
on a certain occasion, is set down at twentj'-two thousand two 
hundred and ninety-three, which would make about eighty-eight 
children for each mother. This was u replenishing" rapidly. 
Bui their little tents, like the tabernacle of the Lord, would not 
accommodate one-fourth of that number. This would necessi- 
tate the mothers to Leave most of their children "out in the 

cold." 

The Dumber of the children of Israel that went down to 
Egypt, according to Exod. i. 5, was seventy souls ; and they 






ERRORS OF THE BIBLE. 131 

remained there during four generations, represented by Levi, 
Kohath, Amram, and Moses, making a period (as marginal 
notes state) of two hundred and fifteen years ; though Exod. 
xii. 40, gives it at four hundred and thirty years. But this is 
another case of incredible exaggeration. Four generations of 
ordinaiy length, in that age, would not exceed the marginal 
calculation of two hundred and fifteen 3-ears ; and for those 
seventy souls to increase to two millions in that short period of 
time, of four generations, would have required each mother to 
have had twelve or fifteen children at a birth. 

3. Dan, in the first generation, had but one son (Gen. xlvi. 
23) ; yet in the fourth generation he had increased to sixty-two 
thousand seven hundred, or, according to Num. xxvi. 43, to 
sixt t y-four thousand, which would have required each son and 
grandson to have had about eighty children apiece. This would 
have been " multiplying and replenishing "ona rapid scale. 

4. Aaron and his two sons had to make all the offerings, and 
on an altar only nine feet square ; and an offering had to be 
made at the birth of every child, which would require about 
five hundred sacrifices daily ; and then there were thirteen cities 
where these offerings had to be made, and only three priests to 
doit. (See Lev. i. 11.) And, besides, the priests had to 
eat a large portion of the burnt offerings (see Num. xviii. 10) ; 
and, as these offerings consisted of five hundred lambs and 
pigeons, it would subject them to the task of eating enormous 
quantities daily. 

5. At the second passover, an offering had to be made for 
e\wr family (Exod. xii.), which would require the slaughter 
of about one hundred and fift} T thousand lambs. The three 
priests had to sprinkle the blood of these lambs ; and it had to 
be done in about two hours (1 Chron. xxx. 35). The lambs 
had to be sacrificed at the rate of about one thousand two hun- 
dred and fifty a minute, and each priest had to sprinkle the 
blood of more than four hundred lambs per minute with their 
own hands, which would make the affair rather a bloody busi- 
ness, if it were not wholly impossible, and therefore an incredible 
story. 

6. If we could credit the statements of " the inspired writer " 



132 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES, 

of the book of Numbers (see chap, xxxi.), we should have to 
believe twelve thousand Israelites, in a war with the Midianites, 
after selecting out thirt} T -two thousand young damsels, killed 
forty-eight thousand men, eigluVy thousand women, and twenty 
thousand boys ; burned all their cities, and captured all their 
stock, amounting to eight hundred and eight thousand, and all 
this without the loss of a single man. Each Israelite would 
have had to conquer seventy-five resisting enemies, including 
men, women, children, and stock. It is a story too incredible 
for serious reflection. We are told that the clothing of the 
Israelites lasted forty years " without waxing old" (see Deut. 
xxix . 5 ) , — another story too incredible to be entertained for a 
moment. 

7. In Deuteronomy the priests are always called sons of Levi, 
or " Levites ; " but, in the other books of the Pentateuch, they 
are always called u the sons of Aaron," which is an evidence 
they were not written by the same hand. Contradictions. Ac- 
cording to Exod. xviii. 25, Moses appointed judges over Israel 
before the giving forth of the law; but (Deut. i. 6) we are 
told that the appointment took place after the law was issued at 
Sinai. 

8. According to Deuteronomy, chap, x., u the Lord separated 
the tribe of Levi " after the death of Aaron ; but, according to 
Numbers, chap, iii., the separation took place before his death. 

9. According to Exodus, God instituted the sabbath because 
he rested on that day ; but, according to Deuteronomy, it was 
because lie brought the Israelites out of Egypt iw by a stretchcd- 
out arm." In Deuteronomy, chap, xiv., every creeping thing 
that flietfa is declared to be unclean, and is forbidden to be eaten ; 
but in Leviticus, chap, xi., every creeping thing, including four 
kinds of locusts, is allowed, and is prescribed as a part of their 
food. 

in. in Exodus, chap, vi., God is represented as saying, "By 
my name Jehovah was I not known to them " (the patriarchs). 
But he was* mistaken ; tor that name occurs frequently in Geu- 
In 1 Sam. chap. viii.. we are told the name of Samuel's 
first-born was Joel : and the name of his second, Abiah : but in 
Chronicles, \i. 28., we are told the name of Samuel's eldest son 
was Vashni. Which is right? 



ERRORS OF THE BIBLE. 133 

11. Bad Bible Morals. — Persons mutilated by accident, or 
otherwise in helpless condition, were excluded from the congre- 
gation of the Lord ; while the guilty culprits who caused this 
mutilation were allowed free access to the holy sanctuary. (See 
Lev. xxi.) We consider this bad morality. Innocent base- 
born children were also excluded from the temple, while the 
guilty parents were allowed free admission. 

12. By the law of Moses and the will of God, as is claimed, 
parents were required to stone rebellious children to death ; 
and yet the parents were often the cause of this rebellious dis- 
position, and tenfold more guilty than the children, having cor- 
rupted them by bad influences. (See Deut. xxi.) This is a 
specimen of Bible justice and Bible morality. 

13. The Jeivs not Civilized. — The Lord's chosen people pos- 
sessed so little of the element of civilization, they had to go to 
the King of Tyre to hire artisans and skilled workmen to build 
their temple. (See 2 Chron. ii. 3, and 1 Kings v. 6.) 

14. It is stated that it took one hundred and fifty- three thou- 
sand men seven years to build Solomon's temple, — and heathen 
at that. (See 2 Chron. ii. 17, 18.) Strange, indeed, when it was 
only a hundred and ten feet long, thirty-six feet wide, and fifty- 
five feet high ! (1 Kings vi. 2.) Some of our modern churches 
are much larger buildings, and generally erected in less than a 
year by less than a dozen workmen. It is certainly very dam- 
aging to the exalted pretensions of " the Lord's peculiar 
people ' ' that they possessed minds and intelligence so far 
below the heathen, that no workmen could be found amongst 
them, and they had consequently to go to these same heathen 
to hire workmen to build the Lord's house. Such facts sink 
the reputation both of them and their God. 



134 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

BIBLE CONTRADICTIONS -TWO HUNDRED AND 

SEVENTY-SEVEN. 

It is difficult to conceive how any real benefit or any reliable 
instruction can be derived from a book which contains state- 
ments with respect to doctrines or matters of fact that are con- 
tradicted on the next page, or in some other portion of the book ; 
because it not only confuses the mind of the reader, but renders 
it impossible for him to know, as he reads a statement in one 
chapter of the book, that it is not contradicted and nullified in 
some other chapter, until he has sacrificed sufficient time to 
commit the whole book to memory : and but few persons have 
ever achieved that herculean task. Hence it must be an unrelia- 
ble book as an authority. We know it has been stated by many 
admirers of the ' c Holy Book ' ' that it contains no conflicting 
statements when properly understood. But who is to decide 
when it is properly understood? Here, again, is a conflict of 
ideas. All words have certain specific meanings attached to 
them by common consent. And certainly airy man of good 
sense would not attempt to attach aii} T other meaning to them, 
without stating the fact and clearly defining his new meaning, if 
he expects any reader to understand him, or an}' two readers to 
understand him alike; and, if he writes without giving a hint 
that he lias invented or employed new meanings for the words 
lie uses, we are compelled to assume that his words and lan- 
guage have the ordinary and universally adopted signification. 
With this view of the case (as the writers of the Bible have 
given no hint that they employed new meanings), it is false to 
assume or say there are no contradictions in the Bible, when, if 
we accept language with its ordinary and established significa- 



BIBLE CONTRADICTIONS. 135 

tion, an honest and unbiased investigation will show that it 
contains several thousand statements which conflict with each 
other or with science, history, or moral truth, and hence must 
be totally unreliable as an authority. To prove this, we will 
now enter upon the unpleasant task of arranging and classifying 
a large number of these contradictions found both in the Old 
and New Testaments. 

I. Contradictions in Matters of Fact and in Doctrines. 

1. Was it death to eat the forbidden fruit? Yes: "In the day thou eatest thereof, 
thou shalt surely die" (Gen. ii. 17). No: "And all the days of Adam were nine hun- 
dred and thirty years " (Gen. v. 5). 

2. Can a woman, according to scripiure, ever speak on religious matters ? Yes : " The 
same man had four daughters — virgins — who did prophesy" (Acts xxi. 9). No: "I 
suffer not a woman to teach, but to be in silence " (1 Tim. ii. 12). 

3. Should a man ever laugh ? Yes: "There is a time to weep and a time to laugh" 
(Eccles. iii. 4). No: "Sorrow is better than laughter" (Eccles. viii.3). Yes: "I com- 
mend mirth, because a man hath no better thing under the sun than to eat, drink, and be 
merry" (Eccles. viii. 15). 

4. What is our moral duty relative to trimming the hair on our heads? " There shall 
no razor come upon his head, ... let the locks of his head grow " (Num. vi. 5). " If a 
man have long hair, it is a shame unto him " (1 Cor. xi. 14) . 

5. Is there any remedy for a fool? Yes : " The rod of correction will drive it far from 
him " (Prov. xxii. 15). No : " Though thou bray a fool in a mortar, yet will his foolish- 
ness not depart from him " (Prov. xxvi. 6). 

6. Should we pay a fool in his own coin? Yes : " Answer a fool according to his 
folly " (Prov. xxvi. 5). No : " Answer not a fool according to his folly " (Prov. xxvi. 6). 

7. Is man's life threescore years and ten ? Yes: "The days of our years are three- 
score years and ten " (Ps. xc. 10) . No : " His days shall be ahundred and twenty years " 
(Gen. vi. 3). 

8. Is it desirable to be tempted? Yes : " Count it all joy to be tempted " (Jas. i. 2). 
No : " Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation " (Matt. xxvi. 41). 

9. Which is the tempter, God or the devil? The devil : The devil tempted Christ and 
Judas. (See Matt. iv. 1). God: God tempted David (2 Sam. xxiv. 1). 

10. Does the Lord ever tempt man? No: " Neither tempteth he any man" (Jas. i. 
13). Yes: "And God did tempt Abraham" (Gen. xxii. 1). No: "He blinded their 
eyes, and hardened their hearts " (John xii. 40). 

11. Can God be tempted? No : " God can not be tempted " (Jas. i. 13) . Yes : " They 
have tempted me, the Lord, ten times " (Num. xiv. 22). 

12. Is any thing good? Yes : Every thing (1 Tim. iv. 4). No : " Every thing is cor- 
rupt" (Gen. vi. 12). 

13. How many Gods are there? One : " The Lord our God is the Lord " (Deut. vi. 
4). Several : " Let us make man in our own image " (Gen. i. 26). Three : " There are 
three that bear record in heaven, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost " (1 John v. 7). 

14. Is God omnipresent? Yes: David declares the Lord is everywhere, in heaven 
and earth, and even in hell (Ps. cxxxix. 7) . No : " The Lord came down to see Sodom " 
(Gen. xviii. 20) . Yes: "There is no place where the workers of iniquity can hide 
themselves" ( Job xxxiv. 2z) . No: " Adam and Eve hid themselves from the presence 
of the Lord" (Gen. iii. 8). No: "Cain fled from the presence of God" (Gen. iv. 16;. 
Yes : " Man can not get out of his presence " (Ps. cxxxix. 7) . 

15. Is God omniscient? Yes : " He knoweth the hearts of all men " (Acts i. 24). No : 
" The Lord had to prove the Israelites, and also Abraham, to know what was in their 
hearts" (Deut. viii. and Gen. xxii.). 

16. Is God omnipotent? Yes: "With God all things are possible" (Matt. xix. 26). 
No : " He could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because their chariots were 
made of iron " (Judg. i. 19). 

17. Is God unchangeable? Yes : With him " there is no variableness, neither shadow 
of turning; I change not" (Mai. iii. 6). No: "And the Lord repented of the evil he 
said he would inflict upon the Ninevites " (Jon. iii. 10). 

18. Is God a merciful being? Yes: "The Lord is very pitiful, and full of mercy" 
(Jas. v. 11). No : " I will not pity nor spare, nor have mercy, but destroy " (Jer. xiii. 



136 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

14). Yes: "His tender mercies are over all his works " (Ps. cxlv. 9). No: "Have no 
pity on them, but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling" (Sam. xv. 2). Yes: 
11 His mercy ondureth for ever " (1 Chron. xvi. 34). No : " I have taken away my loving- 
kindness and mercies " (Jer. xvi. 3). 

19. Does God ever hate? No : " God is love " (1 John iv. 16). Yes : " He hated his 
own inheritance" (Ps. cvi. 40). 

20. Is God's anger perpetual? No: "His anger endureth but a moment" (Ps.xxx. 
5). Yes : " Mine anger shall burn for ever" (Jer. xvii. 4). 

21. Is God the author of evil? Yes : " I make peace, and I create evil " (Isa. xlv. 7). 
No : " Out of his mouth proceeds not evil " (Lam. iii. 38). 

22. Is God in favor of war? No : " He is the God of peace." Yes : " The Lord is a 
man of war" (Exod. xv. 3). No: "He is not the author of confusion, but of peace" 
(1 Cor. xir. 33). 

23. Is the spirit of God for peace? Yes: It is " love, peace, joy, gentleness, and 
goodness" (Gal. v. 22). No: "The spirit of the Lord came upon him, and he slew a 
thousand men" (Judg. XV. 16) . Yes: "The spirit of the Lord begets love, peace, and 
goodness" (Gal. v. 22). No: "By the spirit of the Lord Samson slew thirty men" 
(Judg. xiv. 19). 

2',. lias any man seen God? Yes: "Moses, Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and the 
seventy elders of Israel "saw the God of Israel (Exod. xxiv. 9) . No: "No man hath 
seen God at any time" (John i. 18). Yes : " I have seen God face, to face, and my j fe 
lias been preserved " (Gen. xxxii. 30). No: "There shall no man see me, and live" 
(E::od. xxxiii. 20). Yes : " I saw also the Lord standing upon the throne " (Isa. vi. 1). 
No : " Ye have never seen his shape" (John v. 37). 

25. Can any man hear God's voice? Yes: "I heard thy voice in the garden" (Gen. 
iii. 9). No : " Ye have never heard his voice at any time " (John v. 37). 

2u. Does God dwell in light? Yes: "He dwelleth in light which no man can ap- 
proach to "ITim. vi.16). No: "The Lord said he would dwell in thick darkness" 
(1 Kings viii. 12). 

27. Does God dwell in temples? Yes : " I have chosen this [Solomon's] temple for a 
house" (2 Chron. viii. 1G). No: "The Most High dwelleth not in temples made with 
hands " (Acts xvii. 24). 

28. Does God ever tire? Yes: "God rested, and was refreshed" (Exod. xxxi. 17). 
No : " God fainteth not, neither is he weary" (Isa. xl. 33). 

29. Is ( iod a respecter of persons? No : " There is no respect of persons with God " 
(Rom. ii. 11). Yes : " And God had respect to Abel and his offering" (Gen.). 

30. Can God always be found? Yes: "Those who seek me early shall find me" 
(Prow viii. 17). No : " They shall seek me early, but shall not find me " (Prov. i. 28). 

81. Does the Lord believe in burnt offerings? No: "I delight not In the blood of 
bullocks or of lambs or of he-goats" (Isa. i. 11). Yes: "Thou shalt offer every day a 
baUock for a ein-offerlng" (Exod. xxix. 36). 

32. Does the Lord believe in animal sacrifices of any kind? No: "Your burnt offer- 
ings are not acceptable, nor your sacrifices sweet unto me " (Jer. vi. 20). Yes : M Burnt 
sacrifices are sweet unto the Lord" (Lev. i. 9). 

33. Does God beUeve in human sacrifices? No : For he condemned the human sac- 
rifices of the Gentiles. (Set' Deut. xii. 30.) Yes: " For his anger was abated by David's 
hanging the five sons ofMichal in the bill before the Lord." (See 2 Sam. xxi. 8, and 
Judg. xi. 80.) 

84. Does God ever repent? Yes: "It repenteth the Lord that he bad made man" 
((Jen. vi. 6). No : "The Lord is not a man that be should repent " (Num. xxiii. 19). 

86. [s all scripture given by inspiration of God? Yes: "All scripture is given by 
inspiration of (.iod" (2 Tim. iii. 16). Xo : "I speak it not after the Lord" (2 
Cor. xi. 17). 

- war and fighting right? Nb: " They that take the sword shall perish with the 
sword" (Matt, xxvi.62). Ye>: r « He that hath no sword, lei Iiim sell his coat and buy 
one" (Luke xxiL 36). NTo: "Beat your swords Into plowshares, and your spears into 

pruning-hooks " (Mie. iv. 8). Yes: "Beat your plowshares Into swords, and your 

pruning-hooks into spears" (Joel iii. 10). Yes: ''Cursed be he who kcepcth back his 

sw<»rd from blood" (Lev. xlviii. 10). 

ball nation war against nation? Yes : "Nation Bhall rise up against nation" 
(Matt. wiv. 7). No: " Nation shall not rise up against nation" (Mic. iv. 8). 

ball wo love our enemies? Yes: "Love your enemies " (Luke vi. 27). No: 
11 Bring my enemies, and slay them before mo" (Luke six. 27). 

hatred right? No: "Whosoever hateth his broth r is a murderer "(Uohn iii. 15). 
ii must Bate father and mother, brother and sister, 860., or ye can not be true 
followers of Christ " (Luke xiv. 26). 

40. I- anger commended? Yes : "Be ye angry, and tin not" (Eph.lv. 26). No: 
44 Anger resteth in the bosom <»f tools " (Eocles. vii. 9). 

41. Is it right to steal and rob ? No : l l Thou shalt not steal " (Exod. xx. 15) ; " Neither 



BIBLE CONTRADICTIONS. 137 

rob" (Lev. xix. 13). Yes: The Israelites took from the Egyptians "jewels of silver 
and jewels of gold, and raiment, and they spoiled the Egyptians" (Exod. xii. 35). 

42. Is it right to kill? No : " Thou shalt not kill " (Exod. xx. 13). Yes : " Kill every 
male child amongst them." Yes : " Go ye out and slay every man his companion, and 
every man his neighbor, and every man his brother " (Exod. xxxii. 24). 

43. Is it right to lie on any occasion? No: "All liars are to be punished with fire 
and brimstone " (Rev. xxi. 8). Yes :" Go put a lying spirit into the mouths of all the 
prophets " (1 Kings xxii. 21) . No : " Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord " (Prov. 
xii. 22). Yes : " The harlot Rahab lied, and was justified by works " (Jas. ii. 25). No : 
" Say nothing but the truth " (2 Chron. xviii. 15). Yes : ** If the truth of God hath more 
abounded through my lie for his glory, why am I adjudged a sinner? " (Rom. iii. 7). 

44. Is God in favor of lying and deception? No: "Thou shalt not bear false wit- 
ness" (Exod. 20). Yes: " If a prophet is deceived, I the Lord deceived that prophet" 
(Ezek. xiv. 9). 

45. Is a pious life a happy life? Yes: "Come unto me, and I will give you rest" 
(Matt. xi. 28). No : " In the world ye shall have tribulation " (John xvi. 33). 

46. Will righteousness make a man happy? Yes : " There shall no evil happen to the 
just" (Prov. xii. 21). No: "It is through much tribulation the righteous enter the 
kingdom of heaven " (Acts xiv. 21). Yes : " The righteous shall flourish " (Ps. xcii. 12). 
No: " The righteous shall perish" (Isa. lvii. 1). Yes: "The prayer of the righteous 
availeth much" (Jas. v. 16). No: "There is none righteous; no.notone" (Rom. iii. 10). 
Yes : The righteous to be slain with the wicked (Ezek. xxi. 3). No : The " righteous 
not to be slain " (Exod. xxiii. 7). 

47. Can we live without sinning? Yes : " Those born of God can not sin " (1 John iii. 9). 
No : " There is no man that sinneth not " (1 Kings viii. 46). Yes : " He that commiiteth 
sin is of the devil" (1 John iii. 8). No : " There are none that doeth good, and sinneth 
not" (Eccles. vii. 20). 

4S. Does wickedness shorten a man's life? Yes : " The years of the wicked shall be 
shortened" (Prov. x. 27). No: " The wicked live, and become old" (Job xxi. 7). 

Shall we resist evil? Yes: "Put away the evil of your doings" (Isa. i. 16). No: 
" Resist not evil " (Matt. v. 37). 

49. Who can know whether the golden rule is right or wrong? Right : " Whatsoever 
ye would that men should do unto you, do you even so unto them " (Matt. vii. 12) . Wrong : 
" Spare them not, but slay both man and womaavinfant and suckling" (1 Sam. xv. 3). 

50. Is wisdom desirable? Yes : " Happy is the man "that findeth wisdom " (Prov. iii. 
13). No: "Much wisdom is much grief, and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth 
sorrow" (Eccles. i. 18). Yes: "Get wisdom with all thy gettings" (Prov. iv. 7). 
Yes: "Be wise as serpents" (Matt. x. 16). No: "The wisdom of the wise shall be 
destroyed" (1 Cor. i. 19). 

51. Shall we aim a* a good reputation? Yes : "A good name is better than riches " 
(Prov. xxii. 1). No : " Woe unto you when all men speak well of you " (Luke vi. 26). 

52. Are riches desirable? Yes : " The rich man's wealth is his strong City " (Prov. 
x. 15). No : " Woe unto you that are rich " (Luke vi. 24). Yes : " Blessed is the man 
that feareth the Lord, . . . wealth and riches shall be in his house " (Ps. cxii.). No: 
" Blessed be ye poor, for yours is the kingdom of God " (Luke vi. 20). 

53. Can a righteous man be rich, or a rich man be saved? Yes : " In the house of the 
righteous is much treasure" (Prov. xv. 6). No: "It is easier for a camel to go through 
the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God " (Matt. xix. 24). 

54. Does the Lord believe in riches? Yes: "The Lord blessed Job with fourteen 
thousand sheep, and six thousand camels, and a thousand yoke of oxen," &c. (Job xlii. 
12) . No : " A rich man can not enter into the kingdom of heaven " (Matt. xix. 24) . Yes : 
" Wealth and riches shall be in the house of the man that feareth God " (Ps. cxii. 1) . No : 
" Lay not up for yourselves treasures on earth " (Matt. vi. 19). 

55. Shall we use strong drink? No : " Wine is a mocker, and strong drink is raging" 
(Prov. xx. 1). Yes : " Give strong drink to him that is ready to perish " (Prov. xxxi. 6). 

56. Should we ever use wine? No : " Do not use wine nor strong drink " (Lev. x. 9). 
Yes: "Use a little wine for the stomach's sake" (Tim. v. 23). No: "Look not upon 
the wine when it is red" (Prov. xxiii. 31). Yes: " Give wine to him that is of heavy 
heart" (Prov. xxxi. 6). 

57. Is it right to eat all kinds of animals? Yes : " There is nothing unclean of itself; 
eat every moving thing" (Gen. ix. 3). No : " Swine, hares, and camels are unclean; ye 
shall not eat of their flesh" (Deut. xiv. 7). 

53. Is it good to eat flesh? Yes: It is good to eat flesh (Deut. xii. 20). No: It is 
not good to "eat flesh (Rom. xiv. 21). 

59. Is man justified by Avorks? Yes: "Abraham was justified by works" (Jas. ii. 
21). No : " A man can not be justified by Avorks " (Gal. ii. 16). 

60. Is man saved by faith? Yes : " Man is saved by faith without works " (Rom. iii. 
28). No : " Man can not be justfied by faith Avithout works" (James ii. 24). 

61. Should our AA r orks be seen? Yes: "Let your light shine before men" (Matt. v. 
16). No : " Do not your alms before men" (Matt. vi. 1;. 



138 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

62. Is public prayer right? Xo : " Enter into thy closet, and shut thy door " (Matt. vi. 
6). Yea : " Solomon prayed before all the congregation " (1 Kings viii. 22). 

63. How can it be a moral duty to pray, there being no certainty of an answer? " Every 
one that asketk receiveth " (Matt. vii. 8). "The}' that seek me early shall find me" 
(Prov. viii. 17). " Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek 
me early, but shall not find me " (Prov. i. 28). 

64. Is man to be rewarded in this life? Yes : Both the righteous and the wicked are 
to be rewarded on earth (Prov. xi. 31). Xo: They are to be rewarded after death 
(Matt. xvi. 27). 

65. Are children punished for the sins of their parents? Yes : " The iniquities of the 
father are visited upon the children" (Exod. xx. 5). No " The son shall not bear the 
iniquity of the father" (Ezek. xviii. 20). 

66. Should marriage be encouraged? Yes : " Marriage is honorable to all " (Heb. xiii. 
6) . Xo : " It is good for a man not to touch a woman " (1 Cor. vii. 1). 

67. Is divorce right or wrong according to the Bible ? Right : " If thou have no delight 
in her (thy wife) , then thou shalt let her go " (Deut. xxi. 11) . Wrong : " Whosoever shall 
put away his wife, saving for the crime of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery" 
(Matt. v. 32). 

68. Is it right to marry a brother's widow? Yes : " If a man die childless, his brother 
shall marry his widow" (Deut. xxv. 5). Xo : " To marry a brother's widow is an un- 
clean thing" (Lev. xx. 21). 

69. Is it ever right to marry a sister? Xo : "Cursed shall he be who does so" (Deut. 
xxvii. 22). Yes : " Abraham married his sister, and was blessed" (Gen. xx. 2). 

70. Does the Bible allow adultery? Xo : " Whoremongers and adulterers God will 
judge " (Heb. xiii. 4) . Yes : " The Lord commanded Hosea to take a wife of whoredoms " 
(Hos. i. 2). 

71. Is fornication sinful? Yes : " You should abstain from fornication " (1. Thess. iv. 
3). Xo : "Every woman who hath not known man by lying with him, save for 
yourselves" (Xum. xxxi. 18). 

72. Should we always obey kings and rulers? Yes : " To resist [them] is to resist the 
ordinance of God " (Rom. xiii. 3). Xo : " Whether it is right to obey God or man, judge 
ye." Yes : " Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake" (1 Pet. 
ii. 14). " Whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do " (Matt, xxiii. 3). Xo : 
" We ought to obey God rather than man" (Acts v. 29). 

73. Is the obedience of servants a duty? Yes : " Servants, obey your masters" (Col. 
iii. 22). Xo : " Be ye not the servants of men " (1 Cor. vii. 23). 

74. Is slavery right? Xo : " Be not called master; " " Break every yoke" (Isa. lviii. 
6). Yes: " Ye shall buy of the children of the stranger, &c, and they shall be your 
possession " (Lev. xxv. 48). Xo : " Proclaim liberty throughout all the Land " (Lev. xxv. 
10). 

75. Who can tell if baptism is an obligatory ordinance? Yes: " Go ye and teach all 
nations, baptizing them," ^c. (Matt, xxviii. 19). Xo : "Christ sent me not to baptize, 
but to preach the gospel" (l Cor. i. 17). 

76. La Image-making right? Xo : " Ye shall make no image of any thing" (Exod. xx. 
4). Yes: «' Moses made an image of a serpent" (Xum. xxi. 9). 

77. [s circumcision right? Yes: Except ye he circumcised after the manner of men, 
ye can DOl be saved" (Acts xv. 1). No: "Ii ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you 
nothing" (Gal. v. 2). Yes : " Ye must be circumcised" (Acts xv. 24). Xo : " Circumcis- 
ion i- nothing" (Cor. vii. 19). 

7>. I- it right to swear? Xo : "Swear not at all" (Matt. v. 33). Yes: God swore 
eleven times, Bays the Bible. 

7'.». Why was the Bahhath Instituted? Because "God rested on the sabbath day" 
(Exod. ix. ii). Because "he delivered his people on that day" (Deut. vi. 15). 

- it right to observe the sabbath? Xes: "Remember the sabbath day to keep it 
holy." No: " Your new moons and your sabbaths, . . . 1 can not away with. It is ini- 
i. i. 12). 
-l. [a it right to judge? Yes: "Judge righteous judgment" (John vii. 24). No: 
"Judge not, thai ye !"• not judged " (Matt. vii. 2). 

D ;t man work miracles without divine aid? Xo : " Xo man can work such 
mlracl B < ■M-' pi God be with him" (John iii. 2). Yes : "The Egyptians did in like man- 
ner with their enchantments " (Exod. vii. 10). 

a any man ascend to heaven? Yes: "Elijah ascended in a chariot of fire" (2 

Kin-' isoended up to heaven" (John iii. 13). Yes: "All 

up n inn -i -■■<■ death" (I h i>. iz. 27). No: "-Enoch did nut see death " (Heb. xi. 6). 

s;. Should we fear death? Yes: "Christ walked not in Jewry because the Jews 

lit to kill him " (John vii. i). No : " Foar not them that kill the body" (Matt. x. IS). 

85. Will the earth ever be destroyed? Yes: " The earth also shall be burned up " (2 

Pet iii. l";. No: " Bui the earth abidcth forever" (Eccles. i. 4). 

50. L>oes the Bible teach a future life? Y r es : "They shall go away iuto everlasting 



BIBLE CONTB AMOTIONS. 139 

punishment" (Matt. xxv. 46). No : M For that which befalleth men befalleth beasts; . . . 
as the one dieth, so dieth the other," &c. (Eccles. iii. 19). 

87. Does the Bible teach a future resurrection? Yes: "The dead shall be raised" 
(Cor. xv. 52). No: "They shall not rise" (Isa. xxvi. 14) . Yes: "The saints came up 
out of the ground" (Matt, xxvii. 52). No: "Those who go down into the grave never 
come up again " (Job vii. 9) . 

88. Are the actions of men ever to be judged according to the Bible? First, "The 
Father judgeth no man" (John v. 22). Second, " I [Jesus Christ] judge no man" (John 
viii. 15). So there is to be no judgment. 

89. No: " G-od saw every thing was corrupt" (Gen. vi. 11). Yes: "God saw every 
thing he had made was good" (Gen. i. 31). 

90. Yes: "God forgives the sinner" (Jer. xxxi. 34). No: "God kills the sinner" 
(Ezek. xviii. 20). 

91. Yes: " God justifies the ungodly" (Rom. iv. 5). No: "God will not clear the 
guilty " (Exod. xxxiv. 7) . 

92. Yes : " Man is justified by the law " (Rom. ii. 13). No : " Man can not be justified 
by the law " (Gal. iii. 11). 

93. Yes : " Many have sinned without the law" (Rom. ii. 12). No : " Where there is 
no law there is no transgression" (Rom. iv. 18). 

94. Yes : " Heaven isa kingdom that can not be moved" (Heb. xii. 18). No : " I will 
shake heaven and earth " (Heb. xii. 26). 

95. Yes : " Every thing is afraid of man" (Gen. i. 28). No : " The lion is not afraid 
of man" (Prov. xxx. 30)." 

96. Yes : "Every man in his own tongue " (Gen. x. 5). No : " The whole earth one 
tongue" (Gen. xi. 1). 

97. Yes : " All things are become new" (2 Cor. v. 17). No : " There is nothing new 
under the sun " (Eccles. i. 9). 

98. Yes : " You shall make a likeness of a serpent and a cherubim " (Exod. xxv. 18). 
No : "Make no likeness of any thing in heaven above or the earth beneath," &c. (Exod. 
xx. 4). 

99. Yes : " Deborah the prophetess judged Israel" (Judg. iv. 4). No : " A woman is 
not to judge or rule, a man " (1 Tim. ii. 12). 

100. Yes: " God's people shall be ashamed" (Hos. x. 6). No: "God's people shall 
never be ashamed" (Ps. xxxvii. 19). 

101. Yes: "Blessed are the fruitful" (Gen. i. 28). No: "Blessed are the barren" 
(Lukexxiii. 29). 

102. Yes: " Edom being thy brother, do not abhor him " (Deut. xxiii. 7). 'No: "He 
slew of Edom ten thousand " (2 Kings xiv. 7). 

103. Yes: "Bear ye one another's burdens" (Gal. vi. 2). No: "Every man must 
bear his own burden " (Gal. vi. 5) . 

104. Yes: " Labor not for meat" (John vi. 27). No: "He that labors not shall not 
eat" (2 Thess. iii. 10). 

105. In Genesis vi. 5 God declared he would pour out his curses because " the 
imagination of man's heart is evil, and only evil continually." In Genesis viii. 21 he 
gives the same reason for not cursing the world. 

And these are mere specimens of a vast number of similar 
kind. Kings and Chronicles especially are full of such discrep- 
ancies of dates, numbers, names, &c. In one case the author 
of Chronicles makes a son two years older than his father, the 
father being foily and the son forty-two. For proof, compare 
2 Chron. xxi. 20 with xxii. 1,2. And observe, the author of 2 
Chron. xvi. 1 has Baasha, King of Israel, fighting against Judah 
ten years after the author of 1 Kings xvi. 8 has him dead and 
buried. But we have not space to spare to continue the list, as 
it would comprise a large chapter. Let the reader compare the 
names and numbers of the leaders, families, tribes, &c, of the 
children of Israel, as recorded by Ezra (chap, ii.), with those 



140 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

of Nehemiah (chap, vii.), and he will find more than a dozen 
discrepancies and contradictions ; the difference amounting in 
some cases to thousands. He will also find a difference with 
respect to the coronation, period of rule, and termination of the 
reign of various kings, and wide differences tracing genealogic 
families, tribes, &c, if he will compare Kings, Chronicles, 
Samuel, Ezra, Nehemiah, &c. Such are the verbal discrepancies 
of the ;i Word of God ; " such is arithmetic when " inspired," 

Two questions upon the above : 1. How much older can a son 
be than his father according to scripture, basing the inquiry 
upon Chron. xxi. and xxii. ? 2. How long can a man continue 
to fight after he is dead and buried, as is illustrated in the case 
of Baasha, King of Israel? (See contradictions 142, 143, and 
144.) 

Contradictions in History. 

106. When was man created? Gen. i. 25 says after the other animals. Gen. ii. 18 
says before the other animals. 

107. Were seed-time and harvest to be perpetual? Yes: "Seed-time and harvest 
shall not cease" (Gen. viii. 22) . No: "There was neither earing nor harvest" for five 
years (Gen. xlv. 6). 

108. Did Eve see before she ate the forbidden fruit? Yes : " Woman saw before she 
ate the fruit" (Gen. iii. 6). No : " ller eyes were opened by eating the fruit" (Gen. iii. 
7). 

109. "When did the earth become dry after the flood? "In the first month the 
waters of the flood were dried up" (Gen. viii. 13). "In the second month the 
waters of the flood were dried up" (Gen. viii. 12). 

110. How old was Abraham when he left llaran? The eleventh chapter of Genesis 
makes him one hundred and thirty-live years old; but the twelfth says he was only 
seventy-live. 

111. Did Abraham know where he was going? Yes: "He went forth to go into the 
land of Canaan" (Gen. xii. 5). No: "lie went out, not knowing whither he went" 
(Heb.xi.8). % 

112. I > 1 . 1 Gk>d give Abraham land? Yes : "I give it to thy seed for ever" (Gen. xiii. 
15). No: "Abntnam had none inheritance in ii, not so much as to set his foot on" 

. ii. •")). 
US. Did Moses fear Pharaoh? Yes : " Moses fled, fearing Pharaoh" (Exod. ii. 14 and 

No : M Moses did not fear Pharaoh" (Ileb. xi. 21). 
114. Who hardened Pharaoh's heart? "The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh" 
(Exod. lx. 12). " Pharaoh hardened his heart" (Kxod. viii. 1">). 

1 L6. How many fighting men in Israel? Samuel says eight hundred thousand (2 Sam. 
xxiv. 9). Chronicles Bays one million one hundred thousand (1 Chron. xxi. 5). 

lit",. Ho\v- many fighting men in Judah? Samuel says live hundred thousand (2 Sam. 

Chronicles saya four hundred and seventy thousand (1 Chron. xxi. 5). 
117. Who moved David to number Israel? God: "The Lord moved David to num. 
ber Israel" 2 Sam. xxiv. I). The devil: " Satan provoked him to do it" (Chron. xxi. 1). 

1 i >.. Did David sin more than onoe? Yes: "1 have sinned greatly in numbering 
Bam. 24. 10). No: " He sinned only when he killed Uriah " (1 Kings xv. 6). 

119. How many years of famine was David to suffer? Chronicles says it was three 

- miiik 1 sayi it was seven years (2 Sam. xxiv. 13). 

120. How many horsemen did David capture? Samuel says it was seven hundred 
(2 Sam. viii. i . < bronicles says ii was seven thousand (1 Chron. xvill, 4). 

121. What did David pay for his threshing-floor? Samuel says fifty shekels of silver 
(•j Sam. xxiv. 24). Chronicles says sii hundred shekels of sold (l Chron. xxi. 25). 

122. Was David's throne to come to an end? No : "ItsballDe established forever" 
. lxxxix 4). Yes : M It was eust down to the ground " (Pa. lxxxix. 44). 






BIBLE CONTRADICTIONS. 141 

123. Was David really a man after G-od's own heart? Yes : " David was a man after 
God's own heart " (Acts xiii. 22). No : " David displeased the Lord " (2 Sam. xi. 24). 

124. Was it a man or God that Jacob wrestled with? "Jacob wrestled all night 
with a man" (G-en. xxxii. 24). "Jacob wrestled all night with God" (Gen. xxxii. 
30). 

125. How many were there of Jacob's family? " Jacob's family was only 
seventy souls" (Gen. xlvi. 27). "Jacob's family was seventy-live souls" (Acts vii. 
14). 

126. How long was Israel in Egypt? "Israel was four hundred and thirty years 
in Egypt" (Exod. xii. 41). "Jacob was only four hundred years in Egypt" (Acts 
vii. 6). 

127. Did they see what the Lord did in Egypt? Yes: "You have seen all the Lord 
did in Egypt" (Deut. xxix. 2). No : " You have seen nothing he did in Egypt" (Deut. 
xxix. 4} . 

128. Who was the father of Salah? Arphaxad (G-en. xi. 12). Cainan (Luke iii. 35). 

129. Had Michal any children? No: "Michalhad no children unto the day of her 
death " (2 Sam. vi. 23). Yes : " The live sons of Michal " (2 Sam. xxi. 8). 

130. Where was the law written? Exodus says it was written on Mt. Sinai. Deuter- 
onomy says it was written on Mt. Horeb. 

131. How many died of the plague? Numbers says it was twenty and four thousand 
(Num. xxv. 9). Corinthians says three and twenty thousand (1 Cor. x. 8). 

132. When did Zachariah begin to reign? In the thirty-eighth year of Azariah" 
(2 Kings xv. 8) . But a comparison of 2 Kings xiv. 29 and xv. 1 makes but fourteen 
years. 

133. How many stalls for horses had Solomon? We are told in 1 Kings iv. 26, he had 
forty thousand. But, according to 2 Chron. ix. 25, it was only four thousand. 

134. How much oil did Solomon give Hiram? According to Kings v. 11, it was twenty 
measures. But, according to Chron. ii. 10, it was twenty thousand. 

135. Of what tribe was Solomon's artificer, who came from Tyre? According to 1 
Kings vii. 14, he was of the tribe of Naphthali. But, according to 2 Chron. ii. 14, he was 
of the tribe of Dan. 

136. How long were the two pillars of Solomon's porch? According to 1 Kings vii. 
15, they were eighteen cubits long. But, according to 2 Chron. iii. 15, they were thirty- 
five cubits long. 

137. How many baths were contained in the brazen sea? According to 1 Kings vii. 
26, it contained two thousand ; but, according to 2 Chron. iv. 5, three thousand. 

138. How many mothers had Abijah? and who was she? According to 1 Kings xv, 2, 
she was the daughter of Abishalom. But 2 Chron. xi. 20 says she was the daughter of 
Absalom; and 2 Chron. xiii. 2 says she was the daughter of Uriel. 

The chronology of the kings of Judah and Israel are a mass of confusion. 

139. Where was Ahaziah killed, and how often ? According to 2 Chron. xxii. 8, he 
was killed at Samaria; and, according to 2 King ix. 27, he was killed again. 

140. How many did Jashobeam kill? " Jashobeam slew eight hundred at one time " 
(2 Sam. xxiii. 8). No : It was only three hundred he slew (1 Chron. xi. 11). 

141. Who killed the Amalekites? Samuel says " Saul utterly destroyed them" (1 
Sam. xv. 3) . But, according to chapter twenty-seven of the same book^ David killed 
them all, " left neither man nor woman " (1 Sam. xv. 13) . And yet it appears they were 
not well killed; for, forty years after, they fought a battle with Ziklag (see 1 Sam. xxx. 
18), and they were all killed again, " save four hundred young men; " and Simeon after- 
wards slew them. (See 1 Chron. iv. 3.) And yet, although destroyed three times, Jose- 
phus says he was a descendant of the Amalekites. They must have been a live people. 

142. When did Baasha tight a battle with Judah? According to 2 Chron. xvi. 1, it was 
in Asa's thirty-sixth year. But, according to 1 Kings xvi. 8, in the twenty-sixth year of 
Asa, Baasha died, or, at least, vacated the throne, — a difference of ten years. 

143. How did Asa and Baasha stand toward each other? " There was war between 
Asa and Baasha all their days " (1 Kings xv. 16). But, according to Chron. xiv. 1, they 
were at peace ten years. 

144. How long did Baasha reign ? " Baasha reigned over Israel twenty-four years " (1 
Kings xv. 33). But, according to 1 Kings xvi. 5, it was twenty-seven years. 

145. How long did Elan .reign? According to 1 Kings xvi. 8, Elah reigned two years, 
commencing in Asa's twenty-sixth year. 

146. When did Ahaziah begin to reign over Judah? Kings says it was the eleventh 
year of Jo ram (2 Kings viii. 16). Kings also says it was the twelfth (2 Kings viii. 25). 

147. When did Omri begin to reign? " In the thirty-eighth year of Asa began Omri 
to reign" (Kings xvi. 15). But, as Zimri only reigned seven days, and began in Asa's 
twenty-seventh year, Omri must also have commenced in his twenty-seventh year. 

148. When did Ahab commence his reign? "In the thirty-eighth year of Asa began 
Ahab, son of Omri, to reign " (1 Kings xvi. 29). How can that be if Omri reigned twelve 
years? (See 1 Kings xvi. 23). 




142 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

149. When did Jehoram, son of Ahab, begin to reign? " In the eighteenth year of 
Jehoshaphat, King of Judah, began Jehoram to reign (2 Kings iii. 1) . Impossible, if his 
son Ahaziah commenced in Jehoshaphat's nineteenth year (see 1 Kings xxii. 51), and 
reigned two years: seventeen and two are nineteen. And, according "to 2 Kings i. 17. 
and 1 Kings, it was twelve years later, if Jehoshaphat reigned twenty-five years. (See 1 
Kings) . 

•* 150. When did Azziah, or Uzziah, begin to reign? In the twenty-seventh year of 
Jeroboam, according to 2 Kings xv. 1. But, according to 2 Kings xvi. 17 and 23, it was 
only sixteen years. 

151. How long did Jehu reign over Israel? "Jehu reigned over Israel twenty-eight 
years " (2 Kings x. 36). But, according to 2 Kings xiii. 1, he reigned thirty years. 

152. How long did Jehoahaz reign? Jehoahaz reigned seventeen years " (2 Kings 
xiii. 1). But, according to 2 Kings xiii. 10, it was twenty years. 

""* 153. How old was Ahaz when he began to reign? Twenty years. (2 Kings xvi. 2.) 
According to the text (2 Chron. xxiv. 2), his father was about eleven years old when he 
was born. 

New-Testament Contradictions. 

There is a continual conflict in the statements of Christ's 
biographers with respect to the various events of his life as 
compared with each other ; and in some cases they contradict 
themselves. We will present some examples : — 

154. Who came to worship Christ when he was born? Matthew says, "wise men 
from the East" (Matt. ii. 5). Luke says they were shepherds of the same country 
(Lukeii. 8). 

155. How were they led? Matthew says they were led by a star (Matt. ii. 6). Luke 
says by an angel (Luke ii. 3). 

156. What did the parents of Jesus do when he was born? Matthew (ii. 13) says 
they fled into Egypt. But, according to Luke (ii. 26), they staid there forty-one days. 

157. To whom did God speak at Christ's baptism? To him : " Thou art my beloved 
son " (Luke iii. 22). To the bystanders : " This is my beloved son " (Matt. iii. 17). 

158. Where did Christ go after being baptized? Mark says he went immediately 
into the wilderness, and was there forty days (Mark i. 12). John says three days after 
he was in Cana (John ii. 12). 

159. Where was John while Christ was in Galilee? " John was put in prison " (be- 
fore that) (Mark i. 14). " John was baptizing in ^Enon " (John iii. 23). 

160. Where was Christ when he called Peter and Andrew? Matthew and Mark say, 
" walking by the Sea of Galilee." Luke says, " sitting in their ship " (Luke v. 3). 

161. Where were Peter and Andrew at the time? Matthew and Mark say, " in their 
ship, fishing." Luke says, out " washing their nets " (Luke v. 2). 

162. How came Peter and Andrew to follow Jesus? Matthew and Mark say he "called 
them." But, according to Luke, the draught of fishes caused them to go. 

163. Where did Christ heal the leper? Matthew says at the mount, after the sermon 
(viii. 2). Mark say* when preaching in Galilee. 

164. Who told Jesus the centurion's servant was sick? Luke says he sent the elders 
of Israel to tell him (Luke vii. '■'>). But Matthew says the centurion went himself (Matt. 
viii. 5). 

166. Where did Christ go after curing Peter's wife's mother? Matthew says beyond 
the lake, and drowned a herd of swine (viii. 18). Luke says to Nain, and raised the dead 
(Luke vii. 11). 

166. Where did Christ drown the swine with devils? Matthew says in the country 
of G-ergeseues. Mark and Luke say in the country of Gadarenes. 

167. Where did the devils remonstrate against going? Mark (v. 10) says against 
bcinLr sent out of the country. Luke (viii. 31) says it was against going into the deep. 

^Vere Christ's disciples allowed to use staves? Tea'. " Take nothing . . . saves 
staff only" (Mark vi. 8). No: " Take neither shoes or yet staves" (Matt. x. 9). 

169. When did Chrisl pluck the ears of corn? Matthew (xii. 1) says after he had 
appointed his twelve disciples. But Luke and Mark make it after that event. 

17<». What woman Interceded for her daughter? " A woman of Canaan . . . cried 
unto* him" (Matt. xv. 22). The woman was a Greek (Mark vii. 20). 

171. Howgreal was the multitude which Jesus fed with seven loaves and a few fishes? 
Matthew -ays four thousand, besides women and children (xv. 3b). Mark says four thou- 
sand in all (viii. 9). 



BIBLE CONTBABICTIONS. 143 

172. How long was it after Christ was transfigured that he took James and John up 
into the mountain? Six days after (Matt. xvii. 4). Eight days after (Luke ix. 28). 

173. How much power did Jesus say faith as big as a grain of mustard-seed can impart? 
Matthew (xvii. 20) says enough to remove mountains. Luke says (xvii. 6) enough to 
pluck up trees by the roots. Both large jobs for one man. 

174. Who asked seats in the kingdom for Zebedee's children? Matthew says (xx. 22) 
it was their mother. Mark says (x. 35) they asked it themselves. Why did he refuse 
them two seats when he had promised them, with the other ten disciples, twelve thrones? 
(Matt. xix. 28.) 

175. How many blind men did Jesus restore near Jericho? Matthew says (xx. 30) 
two blind men. Mark and Luke say only one, Bartimeus. 

176. Where did he perform this miracle? Matthew says as he was going away from 
Jericho. Luke says as he was coming into the city (xviii. 35). 

177. When did Christ drive out the money-changers ? Matthew and Luke say the day 
he rode into the city. Mark says not till the next day (xi. 11). 

178. What did Jesus tell his disciples about the ass? Matthew says (xxi. 2) he told 
them they would find an ass and colt tied. Mark and Luke say they found tied only a 
colt. And John says it was a young ass, and Jesus found it himself (xii. 14). Mark and 
Luke say he rode the colt. But Matthew (xxi. 7) represents him as riding both the ass 
and the colt. 

179. Who answered Christ's question in the parable of the vineyard? Matthew says 
(xxi. 41) his disciples answered the question. Mark and Luke both say he answered it 
himself. 

180. When did Christ tell the truth about Lazarus? He first said his sickness was not 
unto death, but afterwards said he was dead. 

181. When did the anointment of Christ take place? Matthew says (xxvi. 2) it was 
two days before the passover. But John says it was six days after (John xii. 1). And 
Luke makes it much later (viii. 36 and xxii. 1). 

182. Where did the anointment take place ? Matthew says (xxvi. 6) in the house of 
Simon the leper. Luke says (vii. 36) in the house of a Pharisee. But, according to John, 
it was in the house of Lazarus (xii. 1). 

183. Where was the ointment poured ? Matthew and Mark say on his head. But 
Luke and John say on his feet. 

184. When did Christ say one of his disciples would betray him? Matthew says 
(xxvi. 21) while they " did eat supper." But, according to Luke (xxii. 20), it was after 
supper was over. 

185. Where did Jesus go after supper ? John says " over the brook Cedron " (xviii. 1.) . 
But the other three evangelists say to the Mount of Olives. 

186. When did Judas betray Christ? John says (xii. 27), after supper he went out 
and made the bargain. But the other three say it was before supper he made the bar- 
gain. 

187. Where and to whom did Peter first deny Christ? John says (xviii. 17) to the 
damsel at the door. The other three say to the men in the hall. 

188. To whom was the second denial made ? Matthew and Mark say to a maid. Luke 
says to a man. John says to those who stood by the fire (xviii.). 

189. To whom was the third denial made? Matthew and Mark say to those who 
stood by. John says (xviii.) to the servant of the higli priest. 

190. Where was Christ crucified? John says at Calvary. The other three say at 
G-olgotha. 

191. At what hour was Christ crucified? Mark says (xv. 25) it was the third hour. 
But, according to John (xix. 14), it was after the sixth hour. 

192. How was Christ dressed for the crucifixion? " And put on him a scarlet robe " 
(Matt, xx vii. 28) . " They put on him a purple robe " (John xix. 2) . 

193. What was the drink offered to Christ at the crucifixion? Mark says it was wine 
mixed with myrrh (xv. 23) . Matthew says it was vinegar mingled with gall. But Luke 
represents it as being only vinegar (xxiii. 36). Matthew says Christ tasted it; but, ac- 
cording to Mark, he did not. 

194. Who bore Christ's cross? Matthew says Simon of Cyrene (xxvii. 32). But 
John says Jesus bore it himself (xix. 17). 

195. Which of the thieves reviled him? Mark says both of them (xv. 29). Luke says 
(xxiii. 39) only one of them, and the other reviled him for it. 

196. What were the words of the superscription on the cross? "This is Jesus, the 
King of the Jews " (Matt, xxvii. 37) . " The King of the Jews " (Mark xv. 26) . " This is 
the King of the Jews" (Luke xix. 18). "Jesus, of Nazareth, the King of the Jews" 
(John xix. 19). But one of these can be right. 

197. Was it lawful for the Jews to put Christ to death? Yes : " We have a law by 
which he ought to die" (John xix. 7). No : " It is not lawful to put any man to death " 
(John xviii. 31). 

198. Who came to Christ's sepulcher? Matthew says (xxviii. 1) Mary Magdalene and 



144 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

another Mary. According to John, it was Mary Magdalene only (xx. 1). But Luke says 
the two Marys and Joanna (xxiv. 10). 

199. Was it daylight when they came to the tomb? No: "They came while it was 
yet dark " (John xx. 1). Yes : •" They came at the rising of the sun " (Mark xvi. 2). 

200. Whom did the women see at the tomb? Matthew says (xxviii. 1) an angel sit- 
ting. Mark says (xvi. 5) a young man. Luke says (xxiv. 4) two men. John says (xx. 
12) two angels. 

201. Did any of the women enter the sepulcher? Yes: They entered in (Mark xvi. 
5). No : They did not (John xx. 2). 

202. Who looked into the sepulcher? According to Luke, it was Peter (xxiv. 12). 
According to John, it Avas another disciple (xx. 4). 

203. Did Peter go into the sepulcher? John says he did go in (xx. 6). According to 
Luke, he did not (xxiv. 12). 

204. Did those who visited the tomb relate the case to any one? According to Luke, 
they told the eleven disciples (xxiv. 27). But Mark tells us they said nothing to any man 
(xvi. 8). 

205. To whom did Christ appear after his resurrection? Matthew says to the two 
Marys (xxviii. 9). Mark says to Mary Magdalene alone (xvi. 9). According to Luke, it 
was to two of his disciples at Emmaus. 

206. When did Christ first appear to his disciples? Matthew says it was at Galilee 
(Matt, xxviii. 16). Luke says it was at Jerusalem (Luke xxiv. 33). 

207. How did Christ's disciples feel when they met him? Luke says they were terri- 
fied (xxiv. 37). But John says they were glad (xx. 20). 

208. How often did Christ show himself to the disciples? John says, " This is now 
the third time." But, according to the other three, it was the sixth time. 

209. Where did Christ part from his disciples? Mark says (xvi. 14) it was at Jerusa- 
lem. But, according to Luke, it was at Bethany. 

210. When did Christ ascend? According to Luke, it was the day of his resurrection 
(Luke xxiv. 13). John says it was nine days after (John xx. 26). But, according to Acts 
i. 3, it was forty days after. 

211. From what place did Christ ascend? Luke says (xxiv. 5) it was from Bethany. 
Acts says (i. 5) it was from Mount Olivet. 

212. Did Christ bear witness of himself? Yes : " I am one that bear witness of my- 
self" (John viii. 18). No : " If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true" (John 
v. 21). 

213. Could man bear testimony for Christ? Yes : " Ye also shall bear witness " (John 
xv. 26). No : " I receive not testimony from man " (John v. 23). 

214. Did Christ come on a mission of peace? Yes: " To preach glory to God, . . . 
and on earth peace " (Luke ii. 13). No : " I came not to send peace but a sword " (Matt. 
x. 34). 

21 •"). Did Christ have a dwelling-place ? No : Matthew says (viii. 20), " He had not where 
to lay his head." But John says he had a house, and his disciples saw it (i. 34). 

216. Was ( !hrist the savior? Yes : " Christ is the savior of all men" (1 Tim. iv. 10). 
No: " Beside me [Jehovah] there is no savior" (Isa. xliii. 11). 

217. Was Christ omnipotent? Yes: i( l and my Father are one" (John x. 30). No: 
11 M y Father is greater than I " (John xiv. 28). 

218. Was Christ equal to God? Yes; " He thought it no robbery to be equal with 
God " (Phil. ii. 6). No : " My Father Is greater than I " (John xiv. 28). 

219. Was Christ supreme Gfod? Yes: "He was God manifest in the flesh" (1 Tim. 
iii. 16); No: "He was man approved of God" (Acts ii. 22). 

220. I low did Judas die? Matthew says he went out and hanged himself (Matt, xxvii. 
6). The Acts says he went out and fell headlong (Acts i. 18). 

221. Did the men at Paul's conversion hear a voice? Yes: " Hearing a voice, but see- 
ing no man" (Acts ix. 7). NO! " They heard not the voice " (Acts xxii. 9). 

222. Did John see a book? Yes. "I saw . . . a book written within," &c. (Rev. 

man In heaven or earth could look on the hook " (Hew v. 8). 
^Vas John the Baptist Ellas? Yes: "This is Ellas which was to come " (Matt, 
xi. 1 1). N<> : " Anil he said I am not Klias " (John i. 21). 

224. When did Berodias ask for the head of John the Baptist? Matthew says before 
Herod's great promlsetoher; bat Mark says 11 was after (Mark vi. 24). 

I lioses superseded? Yes : " We are delivered from the law " (Rom. 
vii. 6). N" : " I came not to destroy the law " (Matt. v. 17). 

.vim was the lather of Joseph ? " And Jacob begat Joseph, husband of Mary 
(Matt i. 16). " !!<• was the son of Heli " (Luke iii. 28). 

227, Who purchased the potter's held? "Judas, with the reward of Iniquity" (Acts 
1. 18). "The chief priests took the silver, and bought the potter's field " (Matt, xxvii. ft). 
•The spirit led Christ to Jerusalem" (Acts xx. 22). No: "The spirit 
forbade him t<» go H (Acts \.\i. 4). 

• l go to prepare a place for you" (John xiv. 2). No: "It was prepared 
from the beginning" (Matt. or. 84). 



OBSCENE LANGUAGE OF THE BIBLE. 145 

230. Yes: " The mission of the gospel began at Jerusalem'* (Luke xxiv. 47). No: 
M It began at Galilee " (Acts x. 37). 

231. Yes : " I beseech you as strangers " (1 Pet. ii. 11). No : " You are not strangers " 
(Eph. ii. 14). 

232. Yes: "Christ died for his enemies" (Rev. x). No: "For his friends" (John 
xv. 13). 

233. Yes: "I write unto you, fathers" (1 John ii. 13). No: "Call no man father" 
(Matt, xxiii. 9). 

234. Yes : " I am with you alway " (Matt, xxviii. 20). No : M It is expedient for you 
that I go away " (John xvi. 7) . 

Total, 277, including double contradictions. 

We will not attempt to argue that these conflicting statements 
prove that no such events as here referred to ever transpired, 
and that the whole thing is a fabrication. We only argue that 
it proves the writers were not inspired by infinite wisdom, or they 
would have told the exact truth in all cases, so that there could 
have been no mistakes. It also proves that we never can know 
the real facts, or arrive at an accurate knowledge or the exact 
truth, with respect to any of those doctrines, duties, or events 
the contradictions appertain to ; and, as these contradictions 
refer to almost every doctrine, precept, and event of any im- 
portance, it thus sinks ail Bible teaching into a labyrinth of 
uncertainty. Hence not one single statement in it can be set 
down as absolutely true without corroborative evidence. 

Note. — The reader will observe, from the contradictions in the foregoing list with 
respect to all the duties of life, as well as all the crimes of society, — such as war, intem- 
perance, slavery, theft, robbery, murder, falsehood, swearing, lying, &c, — that it is 
absolutely impossible to learn our moral and religious duties from the Bible. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 



OBSCENE LANGUAGE OF THE BIBLE -TWO HUNDRED 

CASES. 

No person of refinement and good morals, who has not been 
warped and biased by education or religious training in favor 
of the Christian Bible, can read that book through without 
being often shocked and put to the blush by its obscene and 
vulgar language. Indeed, there are more than two hundred 
texts calculated to raise a blush on the cheek of modesty. 
Many of them are so obscene that we would not dare copy 
them into this work. It would not only outrage the feelings of 



146 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

the reader, but it would render the author liable to prosecu- 
tion. A law has been recently passed by Congress prohibiting 
the publication and circulation of obscene literature ; and many 
persons have already been prosecuted under that law, — some of 
them for merely selecting and publishing some of the obscene 
texts of the Bible. But, without being influenced by these 
considerations, we will, in order to spare the feelings of the 
reader, merely state the import of some of these texts. 

1. Omitting the history of Adam, in which we find some not 
very refined language, we will commence with Noah. We are 
told that Noah became so drunk as to strip off all his clothing, 
and one of his sons, to avoid seeing him in that situation, 
walked backward, and covered him : for which act his father 
cursed him. Thus it appears that Noah, although u a righteous 
man," was not a very modest or decent one. And such a man 
being held up as a righteous example must have a demoralizing 
tendency upon those who accept him in this light. (See Gen. ix.) 

2. The story of Abraham and Sarah, and the account of 
Abraham's illicit intimacy with his servant-maid Hagar, as 
related in Genesis (chap, xvi.), and his and Sarah's gossip 
over the affair, is any thing but modest. 

3. The " holy man" Lot: The story of Lot's incest with 
his daughters, as set forth in Genesis (chap.xix.),is both im- 
modest and disgusting. 

4. Rachel and Bilhah : The tea-table talk of Jacob and 
Rachel, about the act of Jacob in seducing their maid-servant 
Bilhah, must be morally repulsive to all only Bible believers. 

5. The story of Leah and Zilpali is not much better. (See 
Gen. xxx.) 

G. The bargain between Leah and Rachel about Reuben's 
mandrakes (Gen. xxx.) is too immodest to relate or con- 
template. 

7. .Jacob's trick of using peeled sticks and poplar-trees 
among liis cattle is something more than a descent from the 
sublime to the ridiculous. And were it not deemed " divine 
revelation, heavenly instruction," it would have been left out 
(Gen, xxx.). 

8, The account of Rachel's stealing her father's images, and 






OBSCENE LANGUAGE OF THE BIBLE. 147 

then telling an indecent falsehood to hide it, is not very suitable 
for a " Holy Book " (Gen. xxxi.) . 

9. The story of the defilement of Dinah we will not attempt 
to describe, as we can not do it without offending decency. (See 
Gen. xxxiv.) 

10. The story of Reuben and Bilhah, in the next chapter, 
may be instructive to the pious, but is not so to persons of 
refined taste. 

11. If you read the narratives of Judah, Onan, and Tamar, 
as related in the thirty-eighth chapter of Genesis, for human- 
ity's sake keep it out of the hands of your children, and use your 
influence to prevent its circulation among the heathen ; for it 
must have the effect to sink them still deeper in moral depravity 
and mental degradation. 

12. The disgusting story of Absalom's familiarity with his 
father's concubines, as related (2 Sam. xvi. 32) , is so disgust- 
ing, that we will barely allude to it. 

Having referred to twelve cases as samples, we shall pursue 
the repulsive subject no further, except merely to indicate the 
chapter and verse where a long list of such cases may be found 
and examined by those who may need more evidence that the 
Bible is an obscene book, not fit to be read in decent society. 

13. Vulgar language is used in representing men as acting 
like dogs. (See 2 Kings ix. 8.) 

14. Job describes disgusting conduct toward a woman (Job 
xxxi. 9). 

15. Solomon's Song of Songs contains much that is obscene 
language from the first to the eighth chapter. 

16. Isaiah makes revolting suggestions relative to stripping 
women. (See Isa. xxxii. 2.) 

17. Ezekiel is represented as eating disgusting food (dung) 
(Ezek. iv. 12). 

18. Jehovah's command to Hosea to marry a harlot is of 
immoral tendency. 

19. Isaiah frequently makes use of vulgar language. One 
case may be found in chap. lxvi. 3. 

20. Another case in Hosea, describing horrible treatment of 
women and children. (See chap. xiii. 16.) 



148 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

21. The conduct of Sechem towards certain women, as told 
in Gen. xxxiv. 4, is loathsome. 

22. The conduct of parents toward their daughters, as de- 
scribed in Deut. xxii. 15, and as enjoined by the Mosaic law, 
is disgusting and shocking in the extreme. 

23. And language no less disgusting, relative to the treatment 
of men, as prescribed b}^ law, is found in Deut. xxiii. 

24. The account of Paul's conversion, as described in Acts 
ix., is extreme^ vulgar. 

The above-cited cases are mere samples of hundreds of simi- 
lar ones to be found in God's Holy Book in the use of indecent 
language, calculated to make any person blush to read in pri- 
vate, much more if read in public. Indeed, no person dare 
read them to a company of decent people. Look, then, how 
the case stands. Look at the mortifying condition in which 
every devout Bible believer in Christendom is placed. Here is 
a book which, it is claimed, emanated from a pure and holy being ; 
which contains so many passages couched in such obscene and 
offensive language, that any person who attempts to read the 
book to a compan}^ must be constantly and critically on his 
guard, and is liable to be kept in a state of fearful anxiety (as 
the writer knows by his own experience) , lest he stumble on 
some of these offensive texts. What an uncomfortable situa- 
tion to be placed in when reading a book which is claimed to be 
perfect in ever} T respect ! We have seen a Bible class in school 
stopped suddenly by the teacher, with orders to close their Bibles, 
because he had observed, b}- looking ahead, that the chapter con- 
tained language which would bring ablush to every cheek if read. 
In the same school we saw a modest boy, of refined feelings, burst 
into tears because he was required to read to the school a cer- 
tain passage in the account of the conversion of Paul. The 
teacher being a devout Christian, whose piet} T overruled his 
decorum, attempted to enforce the reading b} r a threat of pun- 
Ishmcnt, bul failed. We have also seen the offer of one hun- 
dred dollars' reward, standing in a paper for a considerable time, 
to any person who would read a dozen texts to a company of 
ladies, which the gentleman offering the reward might select; 
but no person dared to disgrace himself by accepting the 
oiler. 



CIRCUMCISION A HEATHEN CUSTOM. 149 

And what is the moral, or lesson, taught by these things? 
Why, that the Bible is a very unsuitable book for a refined nation 
of people to read habitually, or for a morally elevated and enlight- 
ened age of the world, though it was probably adapted to the 
age and to the people for which it was written. JThey had not 
attained to the present standard of morality and refinement. 
We cherish no disposition to censure them. They were probably 
honest, and lived up to their highest idea of right. If anybody 
deserves censure in the case, it is the professedly enlightened 
Christians of the present age for going back to a savage, unen- 
lightened age and nation for their religion and morals. 

A Partial List of the Obscene Passages of the Bible. 
The following figures point to texts, many of which are too 
vulgar to be described in any kind of language : — 

G-en. xvii. 2, very disgusting; xix. 8, 33, 35, a shocking case; xx. 18; xxv. 23, disgust- 
ing; xxx. 3, very obscene; xxx. 15, 16; xxxi. 12; xxxiv. 2, 7, 16, 22; xxxviii. 9, loath- 
some; xxxviii. 29; lix. 25; Exod.i.16; xix. 15; xx. 2; xxii. 16; xxxiv. 15, 16; Lev. xii. 
15; xviii. 7, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24; xxi. 7, 20, extremely vulgar; Num. xiv. 33; xix. 5, 
disgusting; xxv. 1; xxxi. 35; Deut. xxi. 11; xxii. 15, 21; xxii. 22, 23, 25; xxiii. 1, very 
disgusting; xxiii. 13, 17, 18; xxv. 5, 7, 10; xxxi. 16; Judg. xi. 37; xix. 2, 25; Ruth i. 11, 
12; iii.; iv. 13; 2 Sam. vi. 20, 22; vii. 12; xi. 4, 11; xii. 11, 12, very disgusting; xiii. 11, 
12, 14, 20, 22, 23; 1 Kings i. 4; iii. 16, 17, 26; xi. 3; xvi. 11, very filthy; xxi. 21; 2 Kings 
xviii. 27, very filthy; 2 Chron. xxi. 13, 15; Esth. ii. 12, 14; Job iii. 10; xvi. 15; xxi. 24; 
xxxi. 10, very disgusting, and 15 ; xxxii. 19 ; xl. 16 ; Ps. xxii. 10 ; xlviii. 6; cxxxix. 13 ; Prov. 
, xxiii. 27; xxx. 16, 19; Eccles. iv. 11; xi. 5; Sol. i. 13; iii. 1; vi. 8; vii. 2, 3; viii. 8; Isa. 
iii. 17; xxvi. 17, very nasty; xlvii. 2; xlix., very obscene; xlvi. 7; Jer. ii. 20; iii. 1, 2, 6, 
9, very filthy, and 13; iv. 31; xiii. 27; xiv. 17; xvi. 3, 4; xxix. 8; xxx. 6; xxxi. 8, 27; 
Lam. ii. 13; vii.; Ezek. iv. 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 25, 28, 33, 35; xviii. 6; xix. 2; xxii. 
11; xxiii. 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 10, 11, 14, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 29, 43; xliv. 25; Hos. i. 2; ii. 2, 4, 5; iv. 
14, 18; vii. 4; ix. 1, 14; Mic. i. 2; iv. 10; Nan. iii. 4; Hab. ii. 16; 2 Esd. viii. 8; ix. 43; 
xvi. 38, 49; Jud. ix, 2; Wisd. of Sol. iii. 13; iv. 6; Ecclus. xx. 4; xxvi. 9; xxxviii. 25; 
xiii. 10; Bar.vi. 29; 2 Mace. vi. 4; Matt. i. 25; xxiv. 19; xxv. 10; Luke i. 15, 24, 31, 36, 
41,44,49; ii. 6, 7,23; xi.27; John xvi. 21; Acts ii. 30; Rom. i. 26, 27; iii. 28; 1 Cor. vii. 1; 
2 Cor. vi. 12; Heb. xi. 11; 2 Pet. ii. 2; Rev. xii. 2; xvii. 1; xviii. 4. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

CIRCUMCISION A HEATHEN CUSTOM. 

Circumcision is a veiy ancient rite, and of heathen origin, 
though we are told in Genesis that it was a command of God to 
Abraham ; and it was nationalized by Moses. It was considered 
by the Jews a very important religious rite, and has been prac- 



150 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

ticed by them from their earliest history. So highly was this 
ordinance esteemed amongst them, that it was in some cases 
performed twice. According to Herodotus and Diodorus, in- 
stead of the Jews getting the command direct from God, they 
borrowed the custom of the Assyrians ; and Josephus silently 
assents to its truth ; and J. G. Wilkinson says, " It was estab- 
lished in Eg} r pt long before Joseph was sold into that country," 
which furnishes evidence of its existence before the time of 
Moses. 

Among the Jews this rite was performed on the eighth day 
after birth : all converts to their religion, and all servants, had 
to submit to the ordinance. 

Jerome says that in his day a majority of the Idumaeans, 
Moabites, Ammonites, and Ishmaelites were circumcised. The 
ancient Phoenicians also observed this rite, and the aboriginal 
Mexicans likewise. The Mahomedans also practice it ; and, 
although the Koran does not enjoin it, it has been practiced 
wherever that religion has been adopted. The rite is performed 
on both sexes in Arabia. This rite was practiced by the early 
Christians. Even the wise Paul gave practical sanction to this 
ordinance in the case of Timothy. The Coptic and Abyssinian 
Christian churches still observe the custom. A circumcision 
festival was established in the Church, and kept on the 1st of 
January in commemoration of the circumcision of Jesus. 

The toleration of this rite by the Jews and Christians shows 
that they were dwelling on the animal plane, — that they had 
not risen to that high state of spirituality which would lead them 
to abandon such heathenish ordinances and customs. It is so 
repulsive to refined society, that some civilized nations have en- 
acted laws interdicting the custom. Yes, this senseless, cruel, 
heathenish rite has to some extent been abandoned, and must 
ere Long entirely disappear from the earth. It can not with- 
stand the lights of science and civilization: it is a childish, 
senseless, obscene, vulgar, heathenish, cruel, and disgusting 
superstition. 

II. Fasting and Feasting. 

A total ignorance of the laws of health is indicated as exist- 
ing amongst the disciples of all the ancient religions by the 



HOLY MOUNTAINS, LANDS, CITIES, AND RIVERS. 151 

alternate extremes of fasting and feasting. The latter is injuri- 
ous to health, and the former, also, if long continued, as was 
frequently the case. But the subject of health did not occupy 
the minds of religious enthusiasts. They knew nothing of the 
laws of health, and cared less if possible. Fasting is reported, 
in some cases, as extending to an incredible period of time, con- 
tinuing in some cases for months. Hindoos often fasted for a 
week, and in some cases, if reports are true, for several weeks. 
Pythagoras of Greece fasted, it is said, forty clays. Both the 
fasts and the feasts were generally held to signalize or celebrate 
some astronomical epoch ; such as the changes of the moon, 
changes in the seasons, &c. The ancient representatives of the 
Christian faith were much given to fasting, as were also some of 
the Jews ; but, at the present day, Christians, with others, are 
more addicted to feasting than fasting, although fasting is en- 
joined by the Bible both by precept and practice. In this 
respect modern Christianity bears no resemblance to ancient 
Christianity. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

HOLT MOUNTAINS, LANDS, CITIES, AND EIVEES. 

I. Holy Mountains. 

Those who have read the Christian Bible are familiar with the 
fact that the ancient Jews and early Christians had their holy 
mounts and holy mountains, and that they are often referred 
to in the Bible. Mount Sinai and Mount Horeb were to the 
Jews consecrated spots. They called forth their highest feel- 
ings of veneration ; they occupied a place in their devout medi- 
tations, similar to that of heaven in the mind of the Christian 
worshiper. It ma}' be said to have been a substitute for 
heaven with the Jews ; for they knew no other heaven, and 
dreamed of no other in their earlier history. And Mount Zion 
was a place equally sacred in the devout meditations of the 
early Christians. All the Oriental nations had their holy 
mountains before the Jews were known to history : Merau was 



152 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

the holy mount of the ancient Hindoos ; Olympus, of the Greeks ; 
Athos, of the Egyptians. It is therefore evident that the found- 
ers of the Christian religion borrowed the idea of attaching 
sacredness to mountains. Several of Christ's important acts 
were represented as having been performed on mountains. His 
sermon was delivered on a mount ; his march into Jerusalem 
was from the "Mount of Olives." Luke says he went and 
abode in the Mount of Olives (xxi. 87). The Devil took him 
up into an exceeding high mountain, and showed him all the 
kingdoms of the world ; and, finally, his earthly career culmi- 
nated on Mount Calvary. " Holy hill," holy mount, and holy 
mountain — the most important of which was Mount Zion 
— are terms often used in the Old Testament. History dis- 
closes very fully the origin of the custom of attaching sacredness 
to hills and mountains. One writer says it was partly from the 
conviction, that, the higher the earth ascends, the nearer it ap- 
proaches the residence of the Gods ; and consequently they would 
the more certainly hear the pra} T ers and invocations of mor- 
tals. Prophets, seers, and anchorites were accustomed, from 
these considerations, to spend much time on the hills and moun- 
tains. In view of these facts, we ma}^ conclude that all persons 
acquainted with history will acknowledge that the Jews and 
Christians derived the tradition of regarding hills and mountains 
as "holy" from the Orientals, and that it is consequently a 
heathen tradition. 

II. Holy Lands and Holy Cities. 
Jerusalem was the principal holy cit} T of both Jews and Chris- 
tians ; and Palestine was their hoi}' land. Here, again, we find 
then anticipated by heathen nations. Thebes was the holy city 
erf Egypt, Ida the holy city of India, Rome the holy city of the 
Gtaeeksand Etonians, Mecca the holy city of the Mahomedans. 
I. like the early Christians who spent much time in visiting 
Jerusalem, the Mahomedans mafae fbeqnent pilgrimages to Mecca. 
Syria w.-is the holy Land of the Chaldeans and Persians. Wis- 
dom the holy land of the Hindoos, and Benares the principal 
'•holy city." And these holy places they visited very fre- 
quently, going in large companies, singing hymns, and reciting 



BIBLE CHARACTERS. 153 

texts from their holy books as they traveled. And Christians 
in the time of Constantine spent much time in traveling to and 
from Jerusalem and the Holy Land, prompted by the same su- 
perstitious notions and feelings. Here we observe another 
analogy in the religious customs of the Jews, Christians, and 
heathens, all of which were derived from ancient India. 

III. Holy Elvers and Holy Water. 
Holy rivers were quite numerous among the devotees of 
the ancient religions. Ganges, in India, appears to have been 
the first river invested with the title of "holy." Its waters 
were used for the rite of baptism, and were supposed to impart 
a spiritual life to the subject of immersion. Jordan and the 
Euphrates were regarded as sacred by the Jews, and the former 
was the chosen stream for the rite of baptism by that nation. 
Even Christ appears to have believed he could receive some 
spiritual benefit by being dipped beneath its waves. The Nile 
was a sacred river in Egypt, and many repaired to it for spir- 
itual benefit. Thus the origin of holy rivers and holy waters 
is plainly indicated to be of heathen origin. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

BIBLE CHAEACTEES. 

I. Character of Jehovah. 



The Old Testament is principally a history of the Jews and 
their God Jehovah, — a narrative of their trials, troubles, treach- 
ery, quarrels, and faithless dealings toward each other. No 
other God ever had so much trouble with his people ; and no 
other nation ever showed so little respect for their God, or so 
little disposition to obey him, or live up to his commands. 
There appears to have been almost a natural antipathy between 
them ; so that they were constantly repelling each other. The 
relationship appears to have been a forced one, possessing but 
few of the adhesive ties of friendship. 



154 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Both parties were apparently happier when separated, as they 
were several times, — on one occasion for a long period (Lam. 
v. 20) . And 3'et, according to the biblical history of the case, 
they got along as well, were as moral and as happy, as when 
their God was with them. Hence it is evident, if he had never 
returned, they would have sustained no serious loss or disad- 
vantage in any way. The case furnishes an argument in favor 
of that class of people who are frequently denounced by the 
priesthood for " living without God in the world." If " God's 
own people " could get along without him, why can not men and 
women of this intelligent age? And the reason he assigns 
for remaining with them as much as he did shows it was not 
from natural affinity or affection for them, but because he had 
M promised " to do so. Did he not know that " a bad promise 
is better broken than kept?" Another circumstance which 
implies that Jehovah cherished but little respect for his people, 
and cared but little about them, is that, from his neglect (as it 
seems most natural to attribute it to this cause) , the}' were lit- 
erally broken up while he was apparently with them. One 
portion of them fell into the hands of Shalmaneser, King of 
Assyria, and the other portion into the hands of Nebuchad- 
nezzar, King of Babylon ; and the} 7 " were never able to regain 
their political power as a nation afterwards. And, to cap the 
climax, ten out of the twelve tribes were lost entirely, thus leav- 
ing Jehovah almost childless, and destitute of worshipers. And 
a search for them for several thousand years has failed to bring 
them to light. This circumstance is entirely irreconcilable with 
the idea that the Jews were the special favorites of God. In- 
deed, it prostrates the assumption entirely beyond defense. It 
proves, also, thai Jehovah's promise never to leave or forsake 
them was not adhered to. (See 1 Sam. xii. 22.) 

And the language and conduct of the God of the Jews on 
several occasions imply that, if lie ever did make choice of them 
ai his pets, he was disappointed in them, and repented of the 
act. When he exclaimed. Wk I have nourished and brought up 
Children, and they have rebelled against me" (Isa. i. 2), he 
virtually confesses he had been short-sighted, or that lie had 
erred In judgment in selecting the Jews as special favorites. 



BIBLE CHARACTERS. 155 

Certainly this is the language of vexation and disappointment, 
and want of judgment or foresight. 

2. We are told " he hated his own heritage ' ' (Jer. xii. 8). 
Here is evinced again a feeling of hatred, vexation, and dis- 
appointment, that no sensible being should manifest, much less 
a God. 

3. " He gathered unto him the children of Ammon and Ama- 
lek, and went and smote Israel" (Judg. iii. 13). This was a 
traitorous act, calculated to discredit any being. Hence it 
could not have been the act of an all- wise and benevolent God. 
Think of such a being getting into a squabble with his own 
children, and having to invoke the aid of heathen tribes to 
subdue them, and get him out of the difficulty ! One day he 
heads an army composed of his " peculiar people " to fight the 
heathen, with the avowed determination to exterminate them, 
and " leave nothing alive that breathes." The next day he 
gets out of patience with their stubbornness and iniquity ; his fury 
gets up to fever heat ; and he traitorously abandons them, and 
joins those same enemies to fight them, and reduce them to 
slavery. It is scarcely necessary to say we do not believe such 
a God ever existed, excepting in the imagination of ignorant 
people. 

4. Again : Jehovah is represented as selling his people several 
times to the neighboring heathen tribes, which again leads to 
the conclusion that he was disappointed in them, tired of them, 
and wished to get rid of them. He sold them once to Jaban, 
King of Canaan (Judg. iv. 2), and twice to the Philistines. 
Wonder what he got, and what he did with the money ! The first 
time he sold them to the Philistines, he told them he never would 
deliver them again : but he seems either to have forgotten his 
promise, or forgot there is a moral obligation to stick to the 
truth ; for he delivered them several times after that, if his 
own biographer and inspired writer tells the truth. Here is 
more evidence that he is fickle-minded and unreliable, or that 
the Bible writers have misrepresented his character. 

5. If we could assume there is any truth in the Bible history 
of Jehovah, we should not wonder that the Jews preferred wor- 
shiping a golden calf to paying their devotions to such a God ; 



156 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

and, on the other hand, it is not surprising that he should mani- 
fest his displeasure toward them, and frequently steal away from 
them, and often confess grief, vexation, and regret for having 
made choice of such an ignorant, rebellious set of rambling 
nomads, who subsisted by war and plunder. 

6. Jehovah's jealousy of other Gods, which he so frequently 
manifested and so often confessed, and which is one of the 
most objectionable traits of his character, must be attributed to 
his own moral defects ; for he acted in such a manner as to 
cause his own people to prefer other Gods to him. He fre- 
quently scolded and punished them for worshiping other Gods, — 
a circumstance which furnishes evidence that other Gods were 
better, and therefore more worthy of being worshiped. What 
else could have caused them to prefer other Gods ? He should 
have acted in such a loving and fatherly manner that other Gods 
could not have been more venerated and sought after. Then he 
would not have been so often vexed, harassed, and perplexed at 
the idolatrous proclivities of his worshipers, and so often resorted 
to retaliation by forsaking them, selling them, enslaving them, 
or delivering them into the hands of the spoiler. In Judges ii. 
14, it is declared, " The Lord delivered them into the hands of 
the spoiler ; " and, in Judges vi. 1, we are told he delivered them 
into the hands of Midian for seven years. This looks like an 
attempt to spoil his own plans, and to falsify his own promises 
to be with them, and protect them at all times. 

7. Much of Jehovah's dealings with his people seemed to be 
by way of experiment, as in the case of trying Abraham's faith 
by requiring him to offer up his son. What an idea for an all- 
wise and omnipotent God, of whom it is said, " Known unto him 
are all his works " ! 

8. But many circumstances prove that Jehovah was not the 
God of the universe, but only a family or national God. 1. 
His acknowledgment of the existence of other Gods (Deut. vi. 
11). 2. His jealousy of other Gods (Exod. xxxiv. 14). 3. His 
traveling on foot, lodging in tents, having his feet washed, eat- 
ing veal and cakes (Gen. xviii.), &c, all tend to prove this. 
4. And the Fact that he could not know what was going on in 
other nations, and not even his own until he visited the spot in 



CHARACTER OF GOD'S "HOLY PEOPLE," THE JEWS. 157 

person (as in the case of the Tower of Babel) , is proof he was 
not the God of the universe. 

9. We can not concede that the " Creator of unnumbered 
worlds " is (like Jehovah) an angry, malevolent being, addicted 
to feelings of revenge and retaliation, which seemed to banish 
the feeling of love and goodness entirely from his mind, and 
who is represented as being frequently thwarted in his designs 
and purposes by the caprices of his weak and ignorant children, 
who, so far from answering his expectations of being the best, 
turned out to be the worst, of his human heritage. Such ideas 
would be derogatory to Deity. 

And this is the God the " American Christian Alliance " are 
trying to obtain a recognition of in the Constitution of the 
United States. What a moral calamity such a step would be ! 



CHAPTEE XXVII. 

CHAEACTEE OF GOD'S "HOLY PEOPLE/' THE JEWS. 

As the Jews are reputedly " the chosen people of God," — 
chosen by him out of all the nations of the earth to be the 
special recipients of his favors, — the chosen instruments through 
which to communicate his will and his laws to the whole human 
race, and chosen to be a moral example for all mankind, for that 
age, and for all future generations, — it becomes a matter of great 
importance to know their real character for morality, for intelli- 
gence, for honesty, and for reliabilhy. And that we ma} r , in 
the effort to present a brief sketch of their character, furnish no 
ground for suspecting any misrepresentation, we will present it 
in the language of Jewish and Christian writers of established 
reputation. It may reasonably be presumed that their own 
writers would be more likely to overrate than underrate their 
virtues. Hear, then, what one of their leading prophets says 
of them. Isaiah thus describes them (Isa. lix.) : u Their hands 
are denied with blood, and their fingers with iniquity ; and their 
lips speak lies ; their tongues mutter perverseness. None of 
them call for justice ; none of them plead for truth. They trust 



158 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

in vanity, and speak lies ; they conceive mischief, and bring forth 
iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hand. Their feet 
run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood. Their 
thoughts are thoughts of iniquity ; wasting and destruction are 
in their paths." Such is a description of God's holy people by 
one of their number. And David completes the picture by de- 
claring, " There is none righteous ; no, not one." 

And Christ calls them " a generation of vipers." Rather a 
shocking picture of God's peculiar people! " Peculiar" they 
were, if Isaiah's description of them was true, — peculiar for de- 
fective character. It is rather strange that Jehovah should have 
selected such moral outlaws as lawgivers and moral examples for 
the whole human race. There were, at the time, several nations 
superior to the Jews in morals and intelligence, and much 
further advanced in civilization. The Greeks, Egyptians, Chal- 
deans, and a portion of the Hindoos were in advance of the 
Jews. 

The Rev. Mr. Hilliard, in a sermon preached in New York in 
1861, says of the Jews, "They were by nature, perhaps, the 
most cruel and blood-thirsty, as well as idolatrous, people in the 
world." And }'et he says in the same sermon, " that the Lord 
chose the Israelites because of their adaptedness of character to 
the carrying out of his divine ends of mere} 7 to the race." What 
cogent reasoning ! Why not select the Devil at once, if beings 
the most cruel and blood-thirsty were best calculated for " car- 
rying out his divine ends of mere}' to the race " ? Here is more 
proof of the evil effects of preaching, or adhering to, a religion 
which is so full of errors, absurdities, and immoral elements, that 
it blinds the moral vision, and weakens the reasoning faculties 
to give it a place in the mind, and leads to a S3'stem of false 
oning, and often corrupts the natural judgment. We have 
more orthodox testimony to show the defective morals of the 
Lord's chosen people. Dr. Burnet (a Christian writer), in his 
- Archeeologia Philosophies } says, " They were of a gross and 
sluggish nature, not qualified for the contemplation of natural 
things, nor the perception of divine ones. And consequently," 
he tells us, " Moses provided nothing for them of an intellectual 
nature and promised them nothing bcj'ond this life, — did not 



CHARACTER OF GOD'S "HOLY PEOPLE," THE JEWS. 159 

teach a future state of existence." Lactantius says, Ci They 
were never visited by the learned men of other countries, be- 
cause they were never famous for literature." St. Cyril says, 
" Moses never attempted to philosophize with the Jews, because 
they were ' grossly ignorant,' and addicted to idolatr} r ." Dr. 
Burnet further sa} T s, " The}' were depraved in their manners and 
discipline, and almost bereaved of humanity. If I may speak 
the truth, . . . they were a vile company of men, — an assembly 
of slaves brought out of Egyptian prisons, who understood no 
art but that of making bricks." Josephus, being a Jew, was 
their friend and defender; and yet he says, "They were so 
illiterate, that they never wrote an}^ thing, or held intercourse 
with the learned." St. Cyril saj^s, " Some of them adored the 
sun as a deity ; others, the moon and stars ; and others, beasts, 
and birds." One writer says, "They hated all nations, and 
were hated by all nations," and they seemed determined to 
exterminate all nations but their own. They might also have used 
the language of an ancient Christian sect, who declared, " We 
are the friends of God, and the enemies of all mankind." Let 
it be borne in mind that the testimonies here cited are not from 
infidel writers, but all from Jews and Christians, who, we should 
presume, could have no motive for exaggerating their moral 
defects, but rather inducements for concealing them. Other 
similar testimony might be presented. Some of the laws which 
Moses adopted for the government of the Jews corroborates 
still further the statement that they occupied a very low position 
in the scale of morals as well as intellect ; for the laws of a 
nation are a true standard of their character. Hence the law 
of Moses prohibiting uncleanness (Lev. xv.), the law against 
incest (Lev. xviii.). Laws against bestiality, to prohibit both 
sexes from carnal familiarity with beasts, and various other 
laws of a similar character, furnish a clear implication that they 
were addicted to all these vile habits ; and a law to compel 
them to wash their hands leads to the conclusion that they were 
inclined to be filthy in their habits. And the following law 
shows that the}' were not very particular about their food : " Ye 
may eat the locust after his kind, and the beetle after his kind, 
and the grasshopper after his kind " (Lev. xi. 22) . Here were 



160 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

three kinds of rather repulsive insects which the Jews were ex- 
pected to eat, at least licensed to use as food. Can such a nation 
be considered to be civilized? If so, where is a nation now ex- 
isting that can not, with equal propriet}^ be said to be civilized ? 
This portraiture of the Jewish character is not here presented 
in any caviling spirit, or to show that they are justly objects of 
either censure or ridicule. Far from it. They most probably 
acted up to the highest light they were in possession of. The 
primary motive of this exhibition of their character is to show 
that the}' possessed no qualifications and no traits of character 
calculated to fit them for moral lawgivers and moral exemplars 
for us, and for the whole human race; and we can not assume, 
without really dishonoring ourselves, that such a morally and 
intellectually inferior nation of people were the chosen instru- 
ments in the hands of God to communicate the revelation of 
his will to the human family. We are under no moral obligation 
to believe it. A revelation from a pure, perfect, and hoi}' God 
must (if we assume a revelation necessary) come through a 
pure and holy channel : otherwise it would be contaminated and 
corrupted before it reached us. If God could consent to com- 
municate a revelation to the human race through such a channel 
as the Jewish nation furnished, we see not how he could escape 
a stigma upon his character for stooping to such ignoble means. 
And would not the act of familiarizing himself with such a 
people show that he kept bad company, and furnish a bad ex- 
ample to us who are enjoined to be " perfect as our Father in 
heaven is perfect'*? 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

CHARACTER OF MOSES, MORAL DEFECTS OF. 

The history of Moses is so intimately and thoroughly inter- 
blcnded with thai of the Jews, that, to present the character of 
one. is to present the character of the other. We shall there- 
fore devote hut a brief chapter to a special exposition of his 
character, as it will be found fully set forth in the history of 



CHARACTER OF MOSES. 161 

the Jews, and the practical illustration of their moral character. 
No religious chieftain ever claimed to be on more intimate terms 
with God, and no writer ever presented a more dishonorable 
exhibition of his character. He made God the author of nearly 
every thing he said and did, no matter how wicked, how cruel, 
how demoralizing, or how shocking to decency or refined moral 
sensibilities. If some of his characteristics of God are not 
blasphemous, we can have but little use for the word. Some 
of his laws serve as an illustration of this statement. He says, 
" The Lord spake unto Moses," and told him that no person 
with a flat nose or crooked back or broken hand, a crooked 
eye, or who was lame or possessing any kind of a physical 
blemish, should be admitted into the congregation of the Lord 
(Lev. xxi.) This was punishing the unfortunate for defects 
the}' could not help, thus aggravating the misfortunes of a class 
who, above all others, had special claims upon his kindness on 
account of the very defects for which they were excluded. 
These laws, and many others no better, sufficiently illustrate the 
character of the man. His penal code, which inflicted death 
for two hundred acts, many of them no crime at all (such as 
picking up sticks on the sabbath to make a fire to cook their 
food with) , furnishes conclusive evidence that he was a cruel 
and unmerciful lawgiver. And the fact that he was almost 
constantly engaged in a bloody warfare with neighboring na- 
tions, with the avowed determination to exterminate them, and 
" leave nothing alive that breathes,' ' simply because they pre- 
ferred to worship some other God than the cruel Jehovah, leads 
to the conclusion that he was a bloody-minded warrior. Had 
Christ lived under the Hebrew monarchy, Moses' laws would 
have put him to death ; and yet they both claimed to derive 
their moral code from the same God, the Jewish Jehovah. A 
circumstance is related of Moses killing an Egyptian, and hiding 
him in the sand. And it is stated, " He looked this way and 
that way" before committing the deed, and then concealed the 
dead body. This implies that he felt guilty, and that it was an 
act of murder in the first degree. Although every chapter of 
Moses' histoiy proves him to have been a cruel and bloody- 
minded barbarian, with a moral code possessing but a slight ex- 



162 THE BIBLE OE BIBLES. 

hibition of the elements of mercy, humanity, and justice, yet 
Dr. Gaussel, in his " Theopneustia," calls him u a holy and 
divine man,'' and says, " He was such a prophet, that his holy 
books were placed above all the rest of the Old Testament." 
The doctor furnishes us one of the many cases of the blinding 
and biasing effect of a perverted religious education, and an 
argument in favor of laboring to supersede Bible religion with 
something better. Here we will notice it as a curious circum- 
stance, that, after Jehovah had occupied but six days in creating 
eighty-five millions of worlds, and made most of them in a few 
hours, it should have taken him and Moses both forty days 
to write a law, and a very imperfect one at that. And then it 
would seem it took Jehovah three thousand years to make a 
devil, as his Satanic Majesty does not figure in the Jewish hier- 
archy till after the lapse of that period. 

One of the most conspicuous traits in Moses' mental compo- 
sition was an unbounded self-esteem. Although he claimed to 
be in constant consultation with Jehovah, he seldom yielded to 
his advice when it conflicted with his own judgment. On the 
contrary, he several times detected his God in error, and ad- 
monished him, and entered into an argument to convince him 
that he was wrong ; and, of course, he always came out first 
best in the logical contest. Take, for example, the case of 
Aaron making the golden calf. It occurred while he and Jeho- 
vah were engaged in writing " the holy law" on Mount 
Sinai. When the case became known to Jehovah, it so 
disturbed and aggravated him, that he at once declared he 
would not only punish the guilty sinner, — the apostate Aaron, 
— but would exterminate the whole race. But the better tem- 
pered and more considerate Moses began to reason and remon- 
strate against such a rash act. lie appealed to his honor and 
love of approbation, and told him the Egyptians would report 
that he was not able to get his "holy people" to the prom- 
ised land, and hence killed them to conceal the failu re. "Oh, 
yes. Moses, you are right 1 I never thought of that," was the 

ming reply of Jehorah. And thus Moses proved to be smarter 
than his Grod, and enlightened his ignorance. 

Hoc we will call the attention of the reader to the resemblance 






CHARACTER OF MOSES. 163 

between Moses and the still more ancient Egyptian Mises, or 
Bacchus. It is so striking, that we can not resist the convic- 
tion that they were originally closely connected with each 
other. 1. Bacchus, like Moses, was born in Egypt. 2. Bac- 
chus, or Mises, was also exposed to danger on the River Nile, 
like Moses. 3. Bacchus lived on a mountain in Arabia called 
Nisas ; Moses sojourned on Mount Sinai in Arabia. 4. Bac- 
chus passed through the Red Sea dry-shod with a multitude 
of men, women, and children, as Moses is represented as doing. 
5. Bacchus likewise parted the waters of the River Orontes, as 
Moses did those of Jordan. 6. Bacchus commanded the sun 
to stand still, as Moses' friend Joshua did. 7. Bacchus, with 
his wand, caused a spring of wine to spring from the earth, 
as Moses did a spring of water to flow from a rock with the 
"rod of God," or "the rod of divination." 8. Mises, like 
Moses, also engraved his laws on tables of stone. 9. Both have 
been represented in pictures with rays coming out of their heads, 
indicative of the light of the sun. Thus, it will be observed, the 
resemblance runs through nearly the whole line of their history. 
That Bacchus figured in history anterior to the time of Moses, 
no person versed in Oriental history can doubt, — a fact which 
impels us to the conclusion that the two stories got mixed before 
the history of Moses was written. There is one important 
chapter in the practical life of Moses we can not omit to notice 
before we close his history, as it furnishes a still fuller illustra- 
tion of his character. We allude to his deliverance of u the 
Lord's holy people" from Egyptian bondage. Several of the 
incidents in this narrative are incredibly absurd ; and some of 
them of such demoralizing tendency, that it becomes the duty 
of the moralist to expose them to view. The conduct of his 
God Jehovah toward the King of Egy pt in this case is so repul- 
sive and unjust, that it must call forth the condemnation of 
every honest-minded reader possessing a true sense of justice. 

1. We are told that Jehovah, through Moses, frequently 
ordered Pharaoh to let his people go, and then as often hard- 
ened his heart that he should not let them go ; and filial^ pun- 
ished him with death because he was unwilling to let them go. 
It would certainly be difficult to discover any sense or any justice 
or any consistency in such conduct. 



164 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

2. It looks like not only a strange kind of justice, but mon- 
strous injustice, for Jehovah or any God to- kill a man for 
doing what he had purposely compelled him to do. Live frogs, 
lice, flies, blood, vengeance, and death were poured out upon the 
king and his subjects, ostensibly for the purpose of compelling 
him to liberate the Jewish nation ; and } T et it was morally impos- 
sible for him to do so, because the same Jehovah had planted 
in his mind the determination not to let them go. 

3. When Moses spake to Pharaoh in the name of Jehovah 
to release the Israelites, the king asked, " Who is the Lord [thy 
Lord] that I should obe}^ his voice? " Here let it be borne in 
mind that different nations had their own Gods. And Moses' 
God is here the same itinerant being who had been rambling 
about among the bushes, hunting his lost child (Adam), eating 
griddle-cakes with Abraham, wrestling all night with Jacob, 
getting whipped in a fight with the Canaanites, &c. Pharaoh 
was therefore justified in calling for his credentials. 

4. In nearly all the contests between Jehovah and other 
Gods, their power is fully admitted ; and their success was only 
secondary to that of the God of Israel. The question was not, 
Shall Jehovah succeed, and other Gods fail? but, Shall Jehovah 
be awarded the first prize in the contest, and his name stand at 
the top of the list ? 

5. There are many texts in the Bible which go to show that 
Jehovah was jealous of other Gods, and perpetuall}^ in fear of 
being outgeneraled by them. "Ye shall know that I am the 
Lord," was the constant burden of his song. In the case be- 
fore us he is represented as sa}'ing to Pharaoh, "In this thou 
shalt know that lam the Lord" (Exod. vii. 17). "It is true 
you have a Clod, and he is very smart and powerful ; but he can't 
come up to nlc. ,, 

6. Jehovah seems to have been actuated by an aspiration for 
fame and power, as well as b} r a sympathy for his people in this 
contest with Pharaoh; for he is represented as saying, " I will 
get me honor upon Pharaoh and his host" (Exod. xiv. 17). 
llei to be displayed a spirit of vanity, and a thirst for 
glory, — the aspiration of vain rulers and petty tyrants. 

7. The magicians kept up with Moses' God in the perform- 



CRABACTEB OF MOSES. 165 

ance of miracles till it came to making lice: here the} 1 - failed. 
We might conjecture it was because all the dust had been already 
converted into lice by Jehovah, were it not that they had pre- 
viously converted the water into blood just after Jehovah had 
performed that miracle, and left not a pint to drink. 

8. In the achievement of all the ten prodigies, there is no inti- 
mation but that the heathen magicians performed the miracles 
in the same manner that Moses did, and with equal success in 
most cases and in all the most difficult ones ; thus leaving Jeho- 
vah no laurels worth boasting of. 

9. There must have been a great many thousand honest men 
and women in Egypt ; and yet Jehovah is represented as killing 
the first-born of all Egyptian parents without any distinction of 
character, or any regard to their innocence ; and even the first- 
born of beasts also. In the name of justice and mercy, what 
sin had the beasts committed that they had to be punished ? 

10. We are somewhat puzzled to see how the magicians could 
turn all the waters of Egypt into blood, when it was already 
blood, having been converted into blood a short time before by 
Moses and Jehovah. 

11. And it seems strange that Pharaoh should have horses 
enough for six hundred " chosen chariots V (Exod. xiv. 7) after 
they had all been killed three or four times by some of the 
plagues of Egypt. 

12. It is not strange that Aaron's rod should swallow up the 
others as represented ; for he had such a start in the business, 
and had made such a large serpent, he had probably used up 
most of the materials, and left nothing but scraps for making 
others. 

13. The Christian who can lay down his Bible after reading 
such stones as this, and not feel his natural and instinctive love 
of honesty, justice, and morality weakened, must be strongly 
fortified by nature against moral corruption. 



166 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

CHARACTER OF ABRAHAM, MORAL DEFECTS OF. 

A brief history of the father of the Jewish tribe will tend to 
illustrate and indicate the character of the whole nation, as chil- 
dren usually inherit the qualities of their parents. 

1. We will first notice the great promise which Jehovah 
made to Abraham with respect to the boundless extent of his 
future dominion. His seed were to be as the dust of the earth 
or the sands of the sea for multitude (Gen. xiii. 16). And how 
has this promise been fulfilled ? Why, after a faithful compli- 
ance with the command to "multiply and replenish the earth' ' 
for more than three thousand years, his whole tribe only num- 
bers about six million souls, which is less than one in two hun- 
dred of the entire population of the globe. It would take but a 
few handfuls of dust to furnish the particles to represent the 
Dumber, instead of all the dust of the earth as promised or 
predicted. 

2. Jehovah promised Abraham, in the second place, all the 
country "from the river of Egypt to the great river, — the 
River Euphrates" (Gen. xv. 18). And yet, after the lapse of 
three thousand years, we do not find them occupying a foot of 

it. Another failure to execute his promise. 

:>. "To thee will I give it [the promised land], and to thy 

I forever" (den. xiii. 15). It will be observed here, that 
the title and possession was to he perpetual, — to the end of the 
world, "for ever," And yet it has been in the possession of 
other nations live or six times; and now not one family of the 
Lord's holy people c.'in l»c found there. Another signal failure. 
1. Jehovah promised Abraham all the land "from the river 
of Egypt to the River Euphrates ; " but they have never had 
LOO of the country within two hundred miles of the river 



CHARACTER OF ABRAHAM. 167 

of Egypt (Nile). A writer quaintly suggests that Jehovah 
could never have previously seen the country he selected for his 
holy people, or he would not have chosen it ; for all modern trav- 
elers agree in describing it as being a poor, mountainous, rocky, 
barren, and desolate countrj\ One writer says, " It is a coun- 
try of. rocks and mountains, stones, cliffs, bounded by vast, 
dreary, and uninhabitable deserts. St. Jerome describes it as 
being "the refuse and rubbish of nature." And this is the 
country, let it be remembered, that Jehovah promised his people 
as the chosen spot of the earth. How little he knew of geography ! 

5. Jehovah and Abraham appear to have been very intimate 
friends, as they ate and slept together; and the "Judge of all 
the earth" was often a guest in the little, narrow, mud-built 
hut of the patriarch to eat veal, parched corn, and griddle-cakes 
with him, and have his feet washed also by the old man (Gen. 
xviii. 18) . From such circumstances it would appear that Jeho- 
vah traveled over the country in the character of a foot-pad or 
"tramp," and got into the mud occasionally. It is strange 
that Christians can read their Bible without noticing this dispar- 
aging caricature of their God. 

6. Abraham's conduct towards his servant-girl Hagar is both 
disgraceful and inhuman, as he first destroyed her character 
and virtue by criminal intimacy, and then turned her and her 
child into the wilderness to starve (Gen. xxi.). Such conduct 
is certainty very reprehensible. 

7. And this is the man who is represented as being chosen by 
a God of infinite wisdom, infinite purity, and infinite holiness, to 
stand at the head of the moral regeneration and salvation of the 
whole human race. Such a conception is derogatory to the divine 
character, and demoralizing to those who read and believe it. 

8. Among other immoral and disgraceful acts of "God's 
chosen servant," "the righteous patriarch," "the Holy man 
of God," was that of uttering. the most shameful and unblushing 
falsehood. He is charged with intentional Lying on two different 
occasions, in representing his wife as being his sister, — once to 
Pharaoh, and once to King Abimelech ; and his wife indorsed 
his falsehood. (See Gen. chap. xii. and xx.) 

9. And yet, in the face of all these immoral deeds, God is 



168 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

represented as saying, "Abraham kept all my commands, all 
my statutes, and all nay laws." (See Gen. xxvi. 5.) 

Hence the inevitable conclusion that Abraham was living up 
to the commands, statutes, and laws of God, while committing 
these crimes and outrages upon humanity. What a moral, or 
rather immoral lesson, is this to place before the heathen of for- 
eign countries, and the children of our own, who read the Bible ! 
It must have a tendency to demoralize them, and encourage 
them in the commission of similar crimes, as certainly as they 
are beings endowed with human frailties. Note these facts. 

10. And we find other disgraceful, as well as incredible, deeds 
charged to the father of " the faithful." The account of the 
surrender of his manhood, and the obliteration of every impulse 
of parental feeling required to obtain his consent to butcher his 
son Isaac upon the altar, imparts a humiliating moral lesson 
(Gen. xxii.). It matters not that he did not commit the deed. 
He consented to do it, and was ready to do it ; which proves a 
state of mind calculated to make humanity shudder. The New- 
Zealanders have been known to point the missionaries to this 
example as a justification of their cruel practices of slaughtering 
human beings. If a father in this age of civilization should do 
such a thing, or even attempt it as Abraham did, he would be 
looked upon as a monster in human shape, or perfectly insane, 
even if he should claim that God called upon him to perform the 
act. It would have been infinitely better to disobey such a God 
than to disobey and outrage every parental and kindly im- 
pulse of his nature. But the case furnishes prima-facie evi- 
dence that Abraham was under a religious delusion in supposing 
God required the performance of such an inhuman deed. To 
assume that he did would make him more of a demon than a 
God. Any man or woman is to be pitied whose education has 
misled him or her, and blinded them so that the}' can not see 
that the reading of a book teaching such lessons must prove 
morally injurious to the mind. 

11. The injunction on Abraham to slay his son is said to 
have been imposed upon him to try his faith. His faith in 
what? 1 would ask. Faith in his own humanity? faith in his 
love and af lection for his son? Nothing of the kind ! but faith 



r 



CHARACTER OF ABRAHAM. 169 

in his susceptibility of rendering himself an inhuman monster. 
Let us suppose a father says to his son, u Richard, I want you 
to draw a knife, and cut your brother Robert's throat; " and 
afterwards explains the matter by telling him he issued this or- 
der to try whether he would obey him. But his son would 
evince more manhood, and a better moral character, by refusing 
to obey him. It is much better to obey the dictates of con- 
science, humanity, and merc} r , than to obey a father or a God in 
a case like this. 

12. And Jehovah is represented as saying, through an angel, 
" Now I know that thou fearest God " (Gen. xxii. 12) ; equiv- 
alent to saying, " If I had not tried this experiment, I should not 
have known any thing about it." What blind mortals human 
beings can become, to suppose that a God of infinite wisdom, 
who " searcheth the hearts of all men," must resort to cruel and 
shocking experiments to find out the the state of their minds ! 

13. But the history of the case discloses the fact that it did 
not effect the end desired, — that of proving Abraham's faith, 
— not in the least, unless we assume that Abraham lied in the 
case. For he said to the young men while on the road to 
the altar, ci Abide here until we [myself and son] go yonder 
and worship, and come again to you." Here is evidence that 
Abraham knew he would bring his son back alive ; that is, that 
Isaac would return with him, or that he told a falsehood in 
order to deceive. The reader can seize which horn of the 
dilemma he prefers. If he knew what the issue of the case 
would be, it would, of course, be no trial of his faith whatever. 
And }^et Paul and other New-Testament writers laud the act as 
being one of great merit and a proof of his faith. 

14. We must hasten on. We can only give a passing notice 
of a few other acts of this illustrious patriarch, in whom Ci all 
the nations of the earth were to be blessed." Jehovah is repre- 
sented as saying to Abraham, on a certain occasion, " I will go 
down now, and see whether they [the Sodomites] have done 
according " to my desire. " If not, I will know " (Gen. xviii. 
21). This is one of several cases in which ' ' the Judge of all 
the earth " is represented as abandoning the throne of heaven, 
and coming down to learn what was going on below. What a 
contracted and ignorant being was the Jewish Jehovah ! 



170 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

15. The mission of Jehovah at one time, when he called upon 
Abraham, was to inform him that his gray-headed wife, ap- 
proaching a hundred years, was to be blessed with a son in her 
old age. Has it never occurred to Bible admirers that this and 
other similar cases represented the Almighty, whom " the heav- 
en of heavens can not contain," as traveling over the country in 
the character of a fortune-teller, notifying old women that the 
laws of nature would be suspended long enough to allow them to 
be blessed or cursed with the care and perplexity of children in 
their old age ? 

16. It should be noticed that Abraham's God never reproved 
him for any of his misdeeds ; while, on the other hand, the 
heathen King Abimelech called the man of God to account for his 
moral defects (Gen. xx.). 

17. One of the most dishonorable acts recorded in the history 
of Abraham's God was that of bringing a plague upon Pharaoh 
and his household for receiving Abraham's wife, wdien it was 
brought about wholly through his treachery and misrepresenta- 
tion, and when it appears that Pharaoh treated her in the most 
respectful manner. 

18. But, with all these moral stains upon the character of 
Abraham, it becomes a pleasant task to record one good act in 
his life. lie seems to have presented the practical proof that 
he was a better man than his God ; for, when Jehovah threat- 
ened the destruction of Sodom for her wickedness, Abraham 
remonstrated, and suggested that it would be an act of injustice 
to destroy the righteous with the wicked. It appears that this 
moral consideration had escaped the mind of Jehovah. What 
an inconsiderate, reckless being Bible writers represent the 
Almighty as being ! 

19. Abraham, according to his history, was a man of valor, and 
achieved some great exploits. For instance, with the assistance 
of his regiment of one hundred and eighteen servants, he chased 
at one time four great kings, with their might}' hosts, — the King 
of Babylon, the King of Persia, the King of Pontus, and the King 
of Nations (Gen. xiv.). He drove them, we are told, more 
than a hundred miles, and recovered his brother Lot from their 
grasp. A lew such daring heroes could have put down the 
American Rebellion without a battle. 



CHARACTER OF ABRAHAM. 171 

20. We will only observe further, that this " true servant of 
the Lord ' ' was both a polygamist and an idolater ; at least we 
have the authorit}^ of the Jewish writer, Philo, for sa}'ing that 
his father was a maker of images, and that Abraham worshiped 
them. Such is a brief outline of the character of the man who 
is held up as an example for us to imitate, and through whom 
u all the nations of the earth are to be blessed," and the man 
who stands at the head of that nation through which, we are 
told, a revelation has been given to the world which is to effect 
the moral regeneration and salvation of the whole human race. 
Whether the means are adapted to the ends, the reader is left to 
judge. 

II. Character of Isaac. 

1. In accordance with the adage, " Like father, like son," we 
find Isaac carrying out the same spirit of fraud and deception 
practiced by his father. When " the men of the plain asked him 
about his wife, he said, she is my sister " (Gen. xxvi.) ; and this 
man Isaac was another of " the faithful servants of the Lord." 

2. If the statement is true that the Lord struck Ananias and 
Sapphira with sudden death for telling a falsehood, as related 
in Acts v., the question naturally arises, Why did Abraham and 
Isaac escape the same fate, as they were guilty of the same sin? 
Why this partiality? Manifestly, this is a bad lesson in morals. 

III. Character of Jacob, Moral Defects of. 

1. " Like father, like son," is again verified in the practical 
life of Jacob. We find this patriarch excels, in moral defects, 
both his father and his grandfather. 

2. His conduct toward his brother Esau, in robbing him of 
his just and inherited rights, is an act which stamps an eternal 
stigma upon his character. When Jacob's father, old and blind, 
asked him, " Art thou my son Esau?" he replied, "I am" 
(Gen. xxvii. 24) , thus telling a base falsehood, and deceiving 
his old father ; and this deceptive and underhanded act caused 
his brother " to cry an exceedingly bitter cry " (Gen. xxvii. 34) . 
What an unfeeling brother was this " true servant of the Lord " ! 
It appears that Isaac and Jehovah both intended that Esau 
should inherit the blessing ; but Jacob outwitted them by the 



172 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

aid and connivance of his mother. This is but a sample of the 
character and conduct of the family throughout their whole 
history. 

3. Jacob seems to have entertained very singular and selfish 
ideas in regard to his religious obligation to serve and worship 
his God. He made it entirely a question of bread and butter, 
or, rather, of bread and raiment. He proposed to strike up a 
trade with Jehovah relative to his future allegiance to his gov- 
ernment, and to fix the terms of the contract himself (Gen. 
xxviii.). He kindly and condescendingly told Jehovah, that if 
he would provide him with food and raiment, and be his con- 
stant companion in the future, " then shall the Lord be my 
God, and this stone shall be God's house; and I will give one- 
tenth to the Lord of what he giveth me " (Gen. xxviii. 20). 
Here is the attempt to drive a bargain with Jehovah on the 
quid-pro-po principle. We are not informed how Jehovah ap- 
preciated this kindly offer. This is an unfortunate omission, as 
every reader must feel interested in knowing whether he ac- 
cepted the proposition ; and henceforth he whom ' ' the heaven 
of heavens can not contain " took up his abode in the patriarch's 
little stone hut. We are led to infer, that, if Jehovah refused to 
accept his terms, Jacob would henceforth refuse to be a subject 
of God's kingdom, and thus bring him to grief. This is a 
sample of the childish conception entertained by the whole 
Jewish nation of " the God of the universe," if we may presume 
their God was any thing more than a family or national deity. 

4. The proneness of the Lord's holy people to falsify, cheat, 
and deceive is well illustrated in the case of Laban, who, after 
Jacob had. by a lair contract, labored seven years for him for his 
daughter Rachel, would not let him have her, but forced his 
older daughter Leah upon him ; and, when Jacob complained, he 
told him lie must serve seven years more if he got Rachel; and 
his Love for her prompted him to accept the terms. But he 

not to have been well compensated for his fourteen long 

U for these two sisters. Their subsequent conduct 

indicates that he " paid dear for the whistle ; " and one month's 

labor ought to have paid for both, even at ten cents a day, for 

they both turned out to be failures. They were, however, a fair 



CHARACTER OF DAVID. 173 

specimen of the race. Rachel stole her father's images ; and, 
when pursued and overtaken by him, she hid them, and told him 
a falsehood to conceal the act. The circumstance of her father 
having images, and of her stealing them, is an evidence that both 
were idolaters (Gen. xxxi.). 

5. It is eas}' to see, from the foregoing facts, from what source 
the Jewish proclivity to idolatry and also to falsehood was de- 
rived. The latter was practically manifested by four hundred 
prophets at one time. It is true the Lord was charged with 
putting the lie in their mouths (1 Kings xxii. 22). 

6. We are told, that, on a certain occasion, " the sons of Jacob 
answered Shechem, and Hamor his father, deceitfully" (Gen. 
xxxiv. 13) ; by which it appears the spirit or propensity to fraud 
and deception was still transmitted to their posterity. 



CHAPTER XXX. 

CHAEACTEE OF DAVID -HIS NUMEEOUS CEIMES. 

Here is one of the illustrious Bible characters who has been 
held up to the world for several thousand years as the " sweet 
singer of Israel," and " the man after God's own heart;" 
whose life is stained by the commission of a long list of crimes 
of the blackest character, some of which would send him to 
the State prison for life if committed in this morally enlightened 
age. 

1 . One of his first acts of moral delinquency was that of turn- 
ing traitor to Achish, King of Gath. After the king had kindly 
given him a ruler ship over the city of Ziklag, he manifested his 
ingratitude by waging an unprovoked war for plunder upon the 
king's friends and relatives, to rob them of their cattle (1 Sam. 
xxvii.). 

2. David, with an army, committed a similar act of aggression 
and spoliation upon the rights and property of Nabal, to attain 
his cattle by robbery (1 Sam. xxv.). 

3. David at one time turned traitor to his own nation by join- 
ing the army of Achish to fight them (1 Sam. xxix.). 



174 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

4. David obtained possession of the kingdom of Isk-bosheth 
by bribery and intrigue, after acknowledging him to be a right- 
eous man (2 Sam. ML). 

5. David robbed Mephiboshetb , the son of his bosom-friend 
Jonathan, and a poor cripple, of one-half of his estate, upon 
the plea that might makes right (2 Sam. xvi.). 

6. David connived at some of the most abominable and 
atrocious crimes of his sons (2 Sam.). 

7. The manner in which David obtained his first wife Michal 
is shocking to all who possess kind and philanthropic feel- 
ings. Saul had proposed a hundred foreskins of the Philistines 
as the price of his daughter ; but David, in wanton cruelty, 
killed two hundred for this purpose. 

8. The manner in which David obtained his beautiful wife 
Bathsheba, to add to his list of wives, might be tolerated in that 
era of barbarism ; but it must be looked upon at the present time 
as an act of cruelty and wickedness. He said to Joab, wC Set 
Uriah in the front of the battle . . . that he may be smitten 
and die " (2 Sam. xi. 15) ; which was equivalent to slaying him 
with his own hands, and for no crime, but solety to get his 
widow for a wife. 

9. Thus, we see, David was not only a polyganiist, but he 
obtained his wives by fraud, murder, and intrigue. 

10. David's dancing naked in public was an indecent act, 
although several cases are reported of " the holy " men of that 
age appearing in public in a state of nudity. His wife Michal 
upbraided him for tc uncovering himself to the C3~es of the 
handmaids, his servants, as one of the vain fellows shamelessly 
uncovereth himself" (2 Sam. vi.)« It is said that u David 
danced before the Lord with all his might." Can we suppose 
the Lord would fancy such sights? 

11. David's treatment of the Moabites in killing two-thirds 
of theni without any just provocation is an act that would hang 
any man of the present day (2 Sam. viii.). 

12. The fiendish act of David in placing the Moabites under 
saws and harrows of iron, and under axes of iron, and making 
them walk through brick-kilns (2 Sam. xii.), bespeaks a heart 
callous with cruelty, and unmerciful as a tiger. The very 



CHARACTER OF SOLOMON. 175 

thought of it is calculated to chill the blood of a person with the 
feelings of common humanity. 

13. David's murder of five step-sons and two brothers-in-law, 
to gratify a malignant grudge toward the house of Saul, is 
another act showing the fiendish character of the man. 

14. When David was so old and stricken in years that no 
amount of bed- clothing could keep him warm, he made this a 
plea for marrying another wife — and a young maid at that — 
to lie in his bosom, and keep him warm (1 Kings i. 1). Lust 
knows no failure in expedients. 

15. David's advice to his son Solomon on his death-bed, to 
assassinate Joab and his other enemies, shows that his ruling 
passions — animosity and revenge — were strong in death. 

16. And finally David's wicked prayer, as found in the hun- 
dred and ninth Psalm, in which he invokes a string of the most 
horrid curses upon his enemies, culminates his immoral history. 
It completes the demoralizing picture of the " man after God's 
own heart." Now, we ask in solemn earnest, is it not evident 
that a book indorsing such characters as David, placed in the 
hands of the heathen of other countries or the children of our 
own, must have a demoralizing tendenc}^? Most certainly, if 
Franklin was right in saying, " The reading of bad examples 
will make bad morals." Remember, the perpetrator of all 
these crimes is said to be " a man after God's own heart." 
If so, then God must have approved of all his crimes. But 
such a God will not do for this age ; and to teach children and 
heathen such a lesson is calculated to effect their moral ruin. 

II. Character of Solomon. 
Solomon's writings and history both show that he was a liber- 
tine, a tyrant, and a polygamist. His tyrannical monopoly 
of seven hundred wives and three hundred prostitutes, making 
him a practical "Free-lover" on a large scale, is an indelible 
stigma upon his character. It was a usurpation of the rights, 
and a trespass upon the liberties, of nearly two thousand men 
and women. It prevented them from filling the mission or 
sphere in life that God designed them to enjoy. The organiza- 
tion of the sexes shows they were designed to be husbands and 



176 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

wives and parents. And the nearly equal number of the sexes 
is an evidence that nearly a thousand men were deprived of 
wives by Solomon's monopoly of women ; while, on the other 
hand, those women were prevented from sustaining the true 
relation of wives. When he could not see those women more 
than once in three years hj calling on one of them each day, it 
is a farce, and an insult to reason, to call them wives. Could 
a woman sustain the practical relation of wife to a man she 
only saw as husband once in three }^ears? The very idea is 
ridiculous, and a mockery of the true marriage relation. And 
yet this is the man who is represented as being such a special 
favorite of God as to receive a portion of his divine wisdom. It 
is a slander, if any thing can be, upon Infinite Wisdom. By 
reading his amorous song, we can learn his motives for enslav- 
ing such a large number of women. 

If this " wise man" is to be accepted as authority (and he 
should be if he got his wisdom directly from God) , then we must 
relinquish all hope of an immortal existence. Hear him : " For 
that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth the beasts : 
... as the one dieth, so dieth the other ; yea, they have all one 
breath, so that a man hath no pre-eminence over a beast ' ' (Eccles. 
iii. 10). Here is a plain and unequivocal denial of man's 
conscious existence beyond the grave. Nor does one Old-Tes- 
tament writer teach the doctrine. Job denies it in still more 
explicit terms, if possible. (See Job xiv. 10.) 

III. Lot and His Wife and Daughters. 

The act of Abram's brother Lot delivering up his two daugh- 
ters to the Sodomites, u to do to them as is good in your ej'es " 
(Gen. xix. 8), must excite reflections in the highest degree 
revolting to the mind of every father who has daughters. The 
act of fl lather voluntarily offering up his virtuous daughters to 
gratify the depraved passions of a mob is too shocking to con- 
template. And to accept such a character as a "righteous 
man" must certainly weaken the faith of the Bible believer 
in a true system of morality, and plant in his mind a very low 
standard of the moral perfections of God. 

We are told (Gen. xix. 2G) that Lot's wife was converted 



CHARACTER OF THE JEWISH PROPHETS. 177 

into a pillar of salt as a penalty for the simple act of looking 
back. Several absurdities are observable in this story : — 

1. It is difficult to conceive how any sin or crime could be 
attached to the natural act of turning the head to look in any 
direction, especially when no injunction had been laid upon 
the act. 

2. If there were any thing so inherently wrong in the act of 
looking back as to be visited with such direful penalties, pillars 
of salt would soon become more numerous than frogs were in 
Egypt. 

3. Reason would suggest that, to put the thing in shape to 
be believed by future generations, the woman should have been 
converted into some imperishable substance, such as granite, 
gold, silver, or pig-iron. A woman made of salt, or salt of a 
woman, would soon dissolve and disappear. 

4. The Hindoos relate that a woman in India was once con- 
verted into a pillar of stone for an act of unchastity ; and 
"the stone is there unto this day." Here is a story with a 
better foundation : the Egyptians have the tradition of a woman 
being converted into a tree for the act of plucking some fruit 
after it had been interdicted. How many of these stories should 
we credit? 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

CHARACTER OF THE JEWISH PROPHETS. 

It is a circumstance indicative of the natural moral defects of 
the Jewish character, that their most "holy men, 5 ' who were 
assumed to be familiar with the counsels of Infinite Wisdom, 
and on terms of dairy intercourse with Jehovah, yet were, 
according to their own history, men of such defective moral 
habits and moral character as to be unreliable either as exam- 
ples of moral rectitude, or with respect to their prophetic utter- 
ances. We will here present a brief sketch of the character of 
the principal prophets, drawn from their own "inspired writ- 
ings : " — 

The leading prophet Isaiah says, " The priest and the prophet 



178 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

have erred through strong drink. They are swallowed up of 
wine. They are out of the way through strong drink. They err 
in vision. They stumble in judgment" (Isa. xxiv. 7). 

Here is a sweeping charge against all the prophets, — not one 
of them excepted. If they err in vision (of course he means 
spiritual vision), then what reliance can be placed in their 
prophecies, especially if it is true, as he declares in chap, ix., 
that Ci the prophets teach lies " ? Then we can not confide im- 
plicitly in any thing they say. This conclusion, and also the 
foregoing portraiture of their character, is confirmed b} T Hosea, 
who says, in chap, ix., that " the Lord will punish the prophets 
for their sins and their iniquities;" also, "The prophet is a 
snare in all his wa} r s ; the prophet is a fool" &c. (Hos. ix. 7, 
9). Micah says that they divined for money, and made the 
people err. What confidence, we ask, can be placed in men, 
either for truthfulness or as moral teachers, who are thus repre- 
sented by their own historians and their own friends to be 
almost destitute of moral principle ? Each one denounces all the 
others. The implied meaning in each case seems to be, " Take 
my pills, and beware of counterfeits.' ' Zechariah, who was one 
of them, declared the Lord would drive them all out of the 
land with the unclean spirits (Zech. xiii. 2) . We should not, 
however, be surprised to find them possessing such a character, 
when their God, Jehovah, is represented as being no better, and 
is on the same moral plane. They, in fact, make him responsible 
for all their moral derelictions and sinful acts by representing him 
as being the author or instigator. "If a prophet be deceived, 
... I the Lord have deceived that prophet" (Ezek. xiv. 9). 
Here the word prophet is used in a general sense, so as to imply 
that none arc excepted. Jeremiah takes God at his word when 
he exclaims, "O Lord, thou hast deceived me" (Jer. xx. 7). 
Here, it will be observed, the moral character of Jehovah and 
his prophets were all cast in the same imperfect mold. 

That superstition reigned supreme in the very highest order 
of the Jewish minds, to the exclusion of science, is shown by 
some of the wild, superstitious freaks of the prophets. Isaiah 

traveled through Egypt and Ethiopia three years stark naked 

(Isa. \\. 8). Such a disgusting exhibition, if attempted in 



CHARACTER OF THE JEWISH PROPHETS. 179 

this age of civilization, would terminate in a few hours by the 
lodgment of the lunatic in the calaboose. Jehovah, it appears, 
first prompted the act, and afterwards spoke approvingly of it 
by saying it was performed by "my servant Isaiah" (Isa. 
xx. 3). 

Ezekiel and Habakkuk both would have us believe that God 
seized them by the hair of the head, and carried them, — the 
former, the distance of eight miles ; and the latter, three hundred 
miles. How Jehovah himself traveled while performing this feat 
of carrying the prophets is not explained. It must have been 
rather an unpleasant way of traveling, and must have caused 
some serious perturbation of mind lest the hair-hold should slip, 
and precipitate them to the ground. If this mode of travel could 
have been continued, it would have superseded the necessity of 
railroads. 

Ezekiel, we are told, lay three hundred and ninety days on 
his left side, and forty daj^s on his right side ; and then, having 
swallowed a roll of parchment with the aid of Jehovah (Ezek. 
iii. 1), he was prepared for business. We are not told what 
was the object in swallowing such a formidable document, or 
how he managed to get into his stomach an article having a 
diameter four times that of his throat. Jeremiah wore cords 
around his neck, and a yoke on his back (rather a singular 
place for a yoke) . Hosea claimed that God commanded him 
twice to go and marry a whore (Hos. i. 2). This looks like a 
connivance at, if not a tacit indorsement of, whoredom. Eze- 
kiel relates a 6 c story ' ' about being carried by ' ' the hand of 
the Lord," and set down among some old dry bones, which he 
proceeded to invest with human flesh and sinews, and then drew 
skins over them to hold the flesh and bones together (Ezek. 
xxxvii.) . Having thus manufactured a new supply of the genus 
homo, he invoked the four winds to inflate their bodies with 
breath, when, lo ! there u stood upon their feet an exceeding 
great army." We use his own language. Here is a story 
that casts all the wild and weird tales of heathen mythology in 
the shade. There would have been no necessity for drafting 
soldiers in the recent Rebellion if the country could have been 
blessed with such a creative genius as Ezekiel. Such stories set 



180 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

all logic at defiance. If the first commandment, "Multiply and 
replenish the earth," had been neglected so as to render it 
necessary to adopt another process for increasing the number of 
human beings, certainly a more rational and decent mode might 
have been invented. We will not relate any more of the curious 
capers of these " inspired men of God." 

Some Christian writers have disposed of such erratic conduct, 
and such wild freaks of fancy, b} r assuming them to be the 
garb or metaphor of some great spiritual truth. This is ex- 
plained by the proverb, " Necessity is the mother of invention ; " 
but the common mind knows nothing of these inventions of the 
priesthood to save the credit of the Bible. Hence, whether true 
or false, such an explanation does not destroy the demoralizing 
influence of such ideas and language upon the public mind ; 
and then it is derogatory to the character of God to assume he 
would do such senseless and unrighteous things as are related 
in some of the above cases. We insist that it would be a 
serious calamity upon the country to make a book containing 
such moral lessons, or rather immoral lessons, "the fountain 
of our laws and the supreme rule of our conduct," as urged by 
the Evangelical Alliance ; and it is a sorrowful and deplorable 
circumstance that such a book is circulated among the heathen 
by the thousand as guides for their moral conduct. We wish 
they would refuse to accept it, as the Japanese have clone in the 
past. 

II. The Prophets Elijah and Elisha. 

There are some peculiar features in the: history of these two 
Hebrew prophets, for which they seem to merit a special notice. 
They appear to have been on very familiar terms with Jehovah ; 
and the whole machinery of heaven, we are led to conclude, was 
under their control, with no special reason wh} T they should 
merit such divine partiality, as they were not overstocked with 
practical righteousness. The acts of raising the dead and con- 
trolling the elements appear to have been to them very common- 
plaoe performances. One of Elijah's greatest miraculous feats 
was that of 44 shutting up the heavens/ 1 so that there was no 
dew nor rain for three years (1 King's xvii. 1). Aside from 



CHARACTER OF THE JEWISH PROPHETS. 181 

the absolute impossibility of intercepting the action of the laws 
which control and regulate- the entire machinery of the universe, 
there are several considerations which render this stor} r wholly 
incredible. It appears, from the language used, that this 
drought extended over the w r hole earth, and all nations must 
have suffered the direful consequences ; and yet none of their 
histories allude to it. The absence of rain and dew for three 
3 T ears must have caused the surface of the earth to become dry 
and parched to a considerable depth, particularly in the torrid 
zone. The creeks and rivulets must have been dried up. Everj r 
spear of grass, every tree, every plant, must have withered and 
perished ; and all the cattle must have died for want of food and 
drink ; and the people must have shared the same fate. Indeed, 
not a living thing could have been left upon the face of the earth 
where this drought prevailed. And }^et no other history makes 
any allusion to such a calamity ; and a circumstance which ren- 
ders it more incredible is, that the moisture which is constantly 
ascending from the earth could not have been held in the upper 
strata of the atmosphere for half that period of time. When it 
ascends and accumulates, and becomes sufficiently condensed, it 
must fall in the shape of rain. 

2. It appears that the prophet himself, in order to escape the 
fatal consequences of this terrible visitation of divine wrath, 
was instructed to flee, and hide near the Brook Cherith, which 
was in the vicinity of Jordan. Here, we are told, he was fed 
by a raven, which brought him both bread and water. The 
queries naturally arise here, Where did the raven obtain those 
articles of food ? Why can not suffering and starvation be pre- 
vented at the present clay by a similar expedient ? Why should 
several millions of human beings have suffered a terrible death 
by starvation in India within a recent period, if ravens can be 
employed as messengers of mercy ? Why should God be par- 
tial? The preservation of the life of the prophet could not 
have been of so much more importance, judging from his sub- 
sequent history, as he achieved but little good afterward ; and, 
as nobody claims to have seen the raven but Elijah, the case 
looks a little doubtful. 

3. The next miraculous feat of Elijah was that of increasing 



182 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

a widow's barrel of meal and cruse of oil after they were nearly 
exhausted, so that they lasted for many months. In nearly all 
such cases we find incredible features, in addition to the impos- 
sibility of performing the act. No reason can be found, in the 
history of this case, for bestowing such miraculous favors upon 
this woman that would not apply to thousands of women now, 
some of them even in a worse state of suffering, and in greater 
need of divine aid. It does not appear that the miracle had 
the effect to convince anybody of the might and power of his 
God, nor that it was designed to produce such an effect. Hence 
nothing was accomplished by it but the relief of the poor 
widow's wants, which was a very good thing ; but, as we have 
already remarked, she had no more claim upon the benevolence 
and munificence of God than thousands of poor widows and 
others of the present day who receive no such aid. 

4. The prophet performed, we are told, another miracle for 
the benefit of this woman, though we do not learn that she was 
more righteous than other women. Her son sickened and died 
(perhaps the meal was not in a very healthy condition) ; and 
Elijah restored him to life. If there were any truth in the story, 
it could be accounted for by supposing the boy was in a state of 
catalepsy, or trance, as life has been revived in numerous cases 
in persons in this condition in modern times ; and the conduct 
of Elijah furnishes some evidence that he understood it in this 
light. He took the body into an upper room, so the performance 
should not 1)0 witnessed by any of the company (perhaps for fear 
of being disturbed ; and he was probably apprehensive that they 
would suspicion. (Vom his actions, that the boy was not dead). 
In fact the narrator does not say he was dead, but only that 
the breath had gone out of him; and this could be said in any 
case of swooning, trance, or catalepsy. 

5. Ahab is reported as reproving Elijah for bringing so much 
suffering upon the people by the great drought. The reason 
the prophet assigns for this divine judgment is worthy of note. 
It was because Ahab and his subjects worshiped a false God 
(Baalim). This explains the whole affair. The Jews were 
always assuming that those who did not worship as they did 
were worshipers of false Gods; but there is no evidence of 



CHARACTER OF THE JEWISH PROPHETS. 183 

this, and no reason in the assumption. As St. John (i. 18) 
declares, " No man has seen God at any time," it follows that 
each worshiper, under every system of religion, pictures out 
the form, size, shape, and character of God for himself; and, 
certainly, other nations had as much right to form their own 
mental conceptions of God as the Jews had, and were as likely 
to form a correct idea of him as they. They could not picture 
out a worse God than Jehovah. Here we have a true explana- 
tion of the reason the Jews were perpetually denouncing and 
making war on other nations : it was simply because they 
would not subscribe to the Jewish creed. The Jews were creed- 
worshipers. 

6. This conclusion is confirmed by the relation, in the next 
chapter, of a contest between the God of Elijah and the God 
of the prophets of Baal. We are told that Elijah's God could 
kindle a fire upon the altar, while theirs could not. Here is 
admitted the existence of other Gods. The only difference be- 
tween them is, Elijah's God was a little smarter. The same 
thing is aimed to be shown in numerous other contests between 
Jehovah and other Gods. It is merely a trial of skill, strength, 
and knowledge. 

7. And because the God of the prophets of Baal fell a little 
behind, and could not quite equal the achievements of Jehovah, 
we are told that Elijah put the prophets all to death. Here is 
another circumstance tending to show that Elijah could not have 
been a true servant of a just God ; for such a God would not 
sanction such cruelty. But the story carries an absurdity upon 
the face of it. To suppose that four hundred and fifty men 
would stand quietly, and submit to be slain by one man single- 
handed and alone, without any resistance, is altogether too 
incredible to be entertained for a moment. 

8. The next achievement of Elijah, after eating a barley cake, 
baked on the coals, and drinking a cruse of water (1 Kings 
xix. 8), was to walk forty days and forty nights, without stop- 
ping to eat or sleep. This performance was almost equal to 
that of the Hindoo, Yalpa, who walked round the sun in eleven 
hours. One story is just as credible as the other. 

9. We are told that, when Ahaziah, who succeeded his father 



184 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Ahab upon the throne, got crippled by falling, and sent to con- 
sult the God of Ekron, Elijah, on hearing of it, asked why 
he did not consult the God of Israel (2 Kings i. 6) ; and, when 
the king's messengers reported to him what the prophet Elijah 
had said, he sent fifty messengers to the prophet to invite him 
to come and see him, that he might consult with him. These 
messengers treated him very respectfully, and called him "the 
man of God ; " but the prophet, we are told, instead of com- 
plying with the king's request, called down fire from heaven, 
which consumed the whole number. When the king heard of the 
circumstance, he sent fifty" more messengers, who shared the 
same fate, and were likewise consumed bj T fire from heaven. 
An uncivil and very wicked thing for a righteous prophet to do. 

10. We are told that Elijah, in the course of his travels, came 
to a stream of water, and took off his mantle, and smote it. 
The water parted hither and thither, and permitted him to walk 
in the bottom of the stream. Another display of his great 
miraculous power ; but it is void of truth. 

11. The last astounding feat reported of this miraculous 
prophet was that of ascending to heaven in a chariot of fire, 
with horses made of the same material. Rather a hazardous 
mode of traveling. This story is contradicted both by the -tews 
of nature, and the express declaration of the Bible itself. The 
former teaches us that the fire would have been extinguished for 
want of oxygen before he had ascended many miles from the 
earth ; and the latter declares, " Flesh and blood can not enter 
the kingdom of heaven ; " and also that " no man hath ascended 
np to heaven but he that came down from heaven," — Christ 
Jesus (.John hi. 13). There are several circumstances which 
render these marvelous achievements of Elijah wholly incredi- 
ble in addition to their setting aside the laws of nature. We 
can not learn that any good was accomplished by it. It does 

not appear that anybody was converted to a life of practical 
while we must assume that GrOd must have 
had ''--it purpose in view to cause him to thus set aside 

and trample under loot his own laws. On the other hand, 
peat deal of bad feeling was engendered, and a great many 
lives destroyed. Ami then there is no allusion whatever to 



CHARACTER OF THE JEWISH PROPHETS. 185 

these astonishing miracles in any other history. All these cir- 
cumstances and considerations warrant us in discarding the 
whole affair, though Christian writers attach great importance 
to it, 

The Feats of Elisha. 

The marvelous deeds of Elisha appear to be, to a considera- 
ble extent, a mere repetition of those of Elijah. Like his 
predecessor, he raised a dead child to life, increased the supply 
of oil for a widow after it had run short, and also increased 
the quantity of good water for the people by a supernatural 
process, though not by a shower of rain, as Elijah did, after a 
three years' drought. There is evidently a disposition to imitate 
and outdo his predecessor : hence he brings water without the 
process of rain. There are two or three incidents in his his- 
tory worth}' of notice : — 

1. When Elijah took his perilous flight heavenward, and left 
him alone, we are told he rent his garments. This act, although 
customary among " the Lord's holy people," was rather an 
insane way of manifesting his grief. A man in this age doing 
so would be taken to the insane asylum. 

2. The second performance of Elisha, deserving particular 
notice, was an act of malignant revenge upon some frolicsome 
boys reminding him that he was bald-headed. For this simple, 
childish, though rude, act of calling him " bald-head," we are 
told he caused "two bears to come out of the woods, and 
tear forty-two of them to pieces." Why the other children 
escaped this fate, we are not told. This conduct on the part 
of the prophet evinces a morose, cruel, and revengeful disposi- 
tion, instead of a philanthropic and benevolent one, as we 
should have expected the Lord's chosen prophet to manifest. 
If the story were a credible one, it would be a stigma upon his 
character while it stands on the page of history. 

3. There is one circumstance related in the history of Elisha 
which seems to indicate that he was a man of rather gross habits. 
It is stated, that, when he killed a yoke of oxen for food, he 
" boiled their flesh with the instruments of the oxen," and gave 
the people to eat (1 Kings xix. 21). We infer, from this Ian- 



186 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

guage, that the oxen were thrown into the cooking-vessel whole, 
without being skinned or cleaned. It must have been rather a 
rare dish, and a tough one also. 

4. AVe will notice one more remarkable incident in the history 
of this remarkable prophet. We are told, that, as some men 
were felling some trees on the banks of the Jordan, one of 
them, by accident, let his ax fall into the stream. On the case 
being reported to Elisha, he soon relieved the man of his trouble 
by throwing a stick into the water, which caused the ax to swim. 
Here is another specimen of the philosophy of the Christian 
Bible. Heathen mythology is full of such lawless stories. 
When the boat in which a Hindoo was rowing capsized, and 
threw his dinner into the Indus, a fish was accommodating 
enough to arrest it in its descent, and bring it to the surface, 
and restore it to the hungiy boatman. A very accommodating 
fish ! as much so as the stick ! 

We will now take a view of the moral bearing of the stories 
of these great " God-chosen " and " God-favored prophets," 
as one Christian writer styles .them. We must assume that God 
would not suspend the action of those laws which secure order 
and harmoiry throughout nature to perform such miracles as 
these prophets are represented as performing, unless some 
great and important end was to be accomplished by it. Well, 
let us sec if this was the result ; if not, we must assume that these 
miracles were never performed. According to Dr. Lardner, 
miracles were always designed to accomplish some great good, 
and generally to remove the skepticism of unbelievers, and to 
convince them of the mighty power of God. But we do not 
find thai any such effects were produced by any of the miracles 
here reported. The performance of Elijah did not convert 
Ahab nor Jezebel, nor the worshipers of Baal, either to the 
faith or to a life of practical righteousness; nor did those of 
Elisha convert Naaman ; nor did either of the prophets convert 
or reform any of the thousands of heathen in the countries 
through which they traveled. The contemporary kings of Judah 

and [grael still continued in their ungodly course as before. In 

a word, nobody was benefited, nobody reformed, and no good 
effected by any of these miracles, only to a tern individuals, who 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 187 

could have been accommodated in the usual way, — by ordinary 
means. On the other hand, bad feelings were engendered, 
mairy lives lost, and much suffering caused by their miraculous 
proceedings. We must conclude, then, that," so far as any 
agency of God is claimed in the several cases, these miracles 
were never performed ; and we have the negative testimony of 
histoiy to prove still further that these miracles were never 
wrought. The history of no other nation mentions them, not 
even the three years of drought ; yet Christ speaks of it, and 
indorses it with all its impossibilities and all its bad conse- 
quences, which is an evidence of his ignorance of natural law. 
As these stories, by their stultifying absurdities, do violence to 
our reason, and also to our moral faculties, on account of the 
cruelty, injustice, bloodshed (for it shows both prophets were 
murderers), we hold, from these considerations, that the influ- 
ence of these stories is demoralizing, and that they should not 
be put into the hands of the heathen, as they are every year by 
the thousand. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 

Idolatry : its Character, Uses, Harmlessness, and Primary 

Origin. 

There is no act, no species, of human conduct, nothing 
recognized as a sin within the lids of the Christian Bible, which 
is perhaps more fearfully or more frequently condemned, or 
denounced with more awful and terrible penalties, than that of 
idolatry. Those who practiced it are ranked with murderers 
and liars (Rev. xxii. 15) ; and it is declared, " They shall not 
inherit the kingdom of God" (1 Cor. vi. 9), but "shall have 
their portion in the lake of fire and brimstone" (Rev. xxi. 8). 
Now, we propose to bestow a brief examination upon the origin, 
character, and practical moral effect of this ancient practice, 
that we may learn the nature of the custom which is thus placed 
at the head of the list of the acts of human depravity, and 



188 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

regarded as the blackest and most infamous crime ever perpe- 
trated by sinful man. We find it manifested under various 
forms, the original or most primitive aspect of which, so far as 
disclosed by the light of history, is known as Fetichism, — the 
worship of inanimate objects. Stretching the imagination far 
away in the rearward of time, — far back along the receding 
pathway of human history, over a series of many thousands, not 
to say millions, of years, — we arrive at a period in which 
man is found occupying a plane of mere animal, sensorial exist- 
ence, connected with which was an imperfect development of per- 
ception and reflection. In this era of his mental growth he began 
to perceive and recognize the motions of objects around him. 
He observed bright and shining bodies rolling over his head, — 
one by da}', and ten thousand more by night. At least he ob- 
served that they changed positions, — being in one locality in the 
morning, and in the opposite direction in the evening. What 
conclusion from these observations could be more natural, more 
childlike (for, bear in mind, this was really the childhood of the 
race) , or more reasonable, than that these bodies possessed life, — 
that the}' inherently possessed the power of locomotion, the same 
ability to move that he did himself, — just as the infant, now gaz- 
ing out upon the sky from the lap of its mother, fancies the darting 
meteor to be a bird or an animal? Wherever the ignorant, illit- 
erate, primitive inhabitants of our globe perceived motion, — 
whether it was displayed in the revolution of the planets, the 
falling tree, or the rippling stream, — there they associated life 
and motion. And, soon learning that these adjuncts of nature 
possessed a power and force superior to that with which they 
thcniM-Ivcs were endowed, their feelings of awe and veneration 

were thereby excited ; and to the highest degree their deep in* 
wrought devotional feelings first found an outlet by bowing in 
humble acknowledgment to the superior greatness of the shining 
orbs wheeling in such majestic grandeur along the deep blue sky, 
and " bidding defiance to all below." This is believed to haye 
been the first form, the first practical manifestation, of religious 
worship, and the first form or phase of idolatry now denomi- 
nated Fetichism. 

— This word is from polus, " many," and Theos, 



PROGBESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 189 

'•God; " and hence is used to denote a belief in many or 
several Gods, which comprehends the second form and stage 
of idolatry. We have spoken of the early recognition by the 
primitive inhabitants of the earth of the motion of the heavenly 
bodies as giving rise to the belief that they possessed self- 
constituted life and volition. But, progressing a step farther, 
their attention was turned to motion where there was no visible 
agent to produce it, — action without a visible actor. The 
thunder rolled and reverberated along the great archway of 
heaven, the winds whistled and moaned through the thick 
foliage of the trees, and rushed along the valleys, oft-times 
with such violence as to overturn their rude tenements, and 
prostrate the towering oak at their feet. Yet nothing could 
be seen of the agent which produced these direful effects. No 
being, no agent, no cause adequate for their production, was 
visible. Hence they very naturally concluded that they were 
produced b} 7 invisible beings who could wing their way through 
space without being seen. This assumed discovery soon gave 
rise to the thought that the stars might be moved by these 
beings, instead of possessing, as they had previously been sup- 
posed to do, an inherent power of motion of their own. And 
these prime movers of the planets they concluded to be Gods, 
or moving spirits. Thus originated the notion of a plurality 
of Gods, each planet having a separate ruling Deity. And the 
sun — being greatly superior to, transcending in magnitude, light, 
power, and influence, all the other luminaries, with their quali- 
ties all combined — was, with the most childlike naturalness, 
supposed to be ruled by the chief of the Gods, "the Lord 
of lords and King of kings." It was he who, every morning 
throwing open the magnificent portals of the Orient, — the huge 
golden gates of the eastern horizon, — slowly lifted aloft his stu- 
pendous body of light; to dispel the deep dark gloom which for 
many hours had been spread like a pall over universal nature. 
It was he who, plowing his way through the heavens, despite 
the mist and clouds piled upon the great highway of his wonted 
march, rolled down at eventide the western declivity of the 
cerulean causeway to give place to Luna, queen of night, real- 
izing that, 



190 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



and that 



" Soon as the evening shades prevail, 
The moon takes up the wondrous tale;" 



"Ten thousand marshaled stars, a silver zone, 
Diffuse their blended radiance round the throne." 



It was this mighty solar orb, " the king of day," who, having 
performed his wonted journey to the south, returned in early 
spring to banish the chilling blasts of the drear cold season ; to 
drive from off the earth the biting frosts and freezing snows of 
gloom-dispensing winter, and pour down, in lieu thereof, his 
genial and vivifying rays to waken the flowers ; to call forth 
vegetation, and ultimately ripen the golden harvest. In a word, 
he dispensed heat, light, life, and blessings innumerable over 
all the earth. How easy, how natural, then, it was for the 
untutored savage to conclude that the indwelling or ondwelling 
spirit of the sun was " the chief of the Gods," to whom aU 
the inferior Deities (those who presided over the stars) bowed 
in humble allegiance, acknowledging his superior swa}-, his right 
to rule over the boundless universe ! The sun, being thus the 
great central wheel of all recognized power, — i.e., the tabernacle 
or dwelling-place of the supreme, omnipotent God, — became the 
principal object of admiration and adoration, the pivot around 
Which clustered their deepest devotional aspirations ; the subor- 
dinate Deities of the planets holding but a second place in their 
devout contemplations and uprising venerations. The worship 
of these imaginary beings, including the ruling and overruling 
•• I rod of all," with his tabernacle pitched in the blazing sun, is 
now termed idolatry, and may be regarded as the seeond phase 
or form of this species of worship. Hence we may note it as 
a remarkable circumstance, that all the principal systems of 
religion now existing, as well as most of those which have 
\hil>it very strong marks of this ancient solar 
worship; and it Is more especially remarkable, that both Juda- 
ism and Christianity, with all their exalted claims to a super- 
natural origin, should be, as they seemingly are, deeply tinctured 
with this ancient Sabean or solar worship. Distinct traces of it 
are observable in the whole religious nomenclature of Christian- 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 191 

ity. It, in fact, pervades the whole sj^stern. This declaration 
is borne out by the fact that nearly every divine epithet, nearly 
every name applied to the Deity in the Christian scriptures, 
including those addressed to Jesus Christ, and also nearly every 
theological term in both the Old and New Testaments, are 
traceable to the ancient solar worship ; that is, the words, when 
traced to their roots, or original form, are found to have been 
solar titles. We will present some samples by way of proof: 
The divine title Lord, in the New Testament, is translated from 
the Greek Kuros, which is the Persian name for the sun ; God 
is from Gad, an Ammonian name for the sun ; Jehovah, by 
translation and declension, becomes Jupiter, which, according 
to Macrobius, is " the sun itself;" Deity is from the Latin 
Deus, which is traceable to dies, a day, — a period of time 
measured by the sun ; Jesus is from Jes or J-es (with the Latin 
termination us) , which means \ ' the one great fire of the sun ; ' ' 
and Christ is derived from Chris, sl Chaldean term for the sun ; 
and so on of other divine titles. And whole phrases of scripture- 
texts disclose the same idolatrous solar origin. Why is Jesus 
Christ called "the sun of righteousness "? (spelled s-u-n, let 
it be noticed) , as this text, quoted from Malachi, is assumed to 
apply to him ; and why is the term " light," so frequently used 
and preferred throughout the Christian scriptures, to denote 
the spiritual condition of man? Why are nations, whose 
minds are cultivated and stored with knowledge, said to be 
" enlightened " ? Certainly, to our external vision, thej r are as 
opaque as the most grossly ignorant barbarians. But they are 
called enlightened when advanced in knowledge, simply because 
all knowledge was once supposed to be imparted by the God 
of the sun through its descending rays of light. Hence light 
and knowledge are now synonymous terms. David says, " The 
Lord is my light and my salvation " (Ps. xxvii. 1) , — just what 
the ancient pagans used to say of the sun. Isaiah says, " The 
Lord shall be to thee an everlasting light" (Isa. lx. 19), — 
exactly such a conception as the ancient heathen entertained of 
the sun, to which its application is more obviously appropriate. 
Habakkuk says, " His brightness was as light " (iii. 4) . Apply 
this language to the sun, and its meaning becomes strikingly 



192 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

significant. Christ is said to be " a light to lighten the Gen- 
tiles,'' "the true light," " the light of the world," &c. ; and 
yet we can not discover that those who have embraced his 
doctrines, and thus come into possession of this " true light," 
shed any more light upon a devious pathway, traveled in the 
darkness of night, than the veriest Jewish pharisee or infidel. 
The Christian reader will reply, " These phrases are mere figures 
of speech." To be sure they are : we admit it. But then their 
derivation and origin are none the less obvious, and, when scru- 
tinizingly examined, disclose remote traces of Oriental idolatry ; 
and, moreover, they most unmistakably prove Christianity to be 
of heathen extraction with respect to its verbal habiliments, or 
external vestment, as well as the main drift and scope of its 
doctrines and teachings, as shown elsewhere. We will observe 
further, that such conceptions (found in the Christian Bible) as 
" God is a consuming fire," " God is light," &c. (John i. 5), 
originated in the primeval ages, when God was supposed to 
reside in the sun; also such ejaculations as "O Lord, the 
Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of 
thy rising " (Isa. lx. 3) . The words " light," " brightness," and 
" rising " apply with striking force to the sun, and were used by 
the ancient Persians in such a relation, while, on the other 
hand, it is difficult to discover any sense or appropriateness in 
applyingthem — at least the word " rising " — to the Supreme 
Being ; for he is represented as always occupying " the highest 
heavens : " so there can be no higher point to rise to. We might 
also ask, Why are "the Lord's day" and "Sunday" used as 
synonymous terms? or why is the Lord now worshiped on the 
\<rv day anciently set apart for the worship of the sun or solar 
Deities? Do not these facts prove that man}' remnants of 
the ancient idolatrous religions are still retained in Christian 
theology? 

Monotheism* — This word — from monos, one, or alone, and 
T/kos. God — represents a belief in but one God. We have 
shown in the preceding section how a belief in a plurality of Gods 
originated. We will now trace the progress of this idea to a uni- 
tary conception of the Deity. It will be observed, by the study of 
ancient theology, that, as the human mind becomes enlightened 



PBOGBESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 193 

and expanded by the discovery of the laws governing the heav- 
enly bodies, the lesser or inferior Deities gradually fall into 
disbelief and disuse, and " the Supreme Holy One " proportion- 
ally becomes exalted in the devout affections of the worshiping 
multitude, until most religious nations become, in one view, 
virtually and practically monotheists. And it may be remarked 
here, that, as neither the imaginary God nor carved images of 
God were objects of worship by the most enlightened classes of 
any nation, they can not strictly and truthfully be termed idola- 
ters. Hence some writers are bold to affirm there never was a 
nation of idolaters ; and we incline to this opinion-. We are also 
bold to affirm that there never was, properly speaking, a nation of 
monotheists, — believing in but one God, and no more, — neither 
Jews nor Christians excepted ; and we are likewise prepared to 
exhibit the proof of the affirmation, that every nation, reported 
in history making a profession of religion, has acknowledged 
the existence of one supreme God. This is true even of those 
who believe in a multiplicity of Gods, — a circumstance which 
places both Jews and Christians in rather an awkward position, 
claiming as they do, and alwaj^s have done, a monopoly of this 
faith ; and the fact that they have long professedly labored to 
bring other nations to this belief, while some of those nations 
have, as we shall show, been much more consistent, both in 
the belief and practice of this doctrine, than themselves, places 
them, as we conceive, in rather a ludicrous aspect. The Chris- 
tian Bible and the Christian world have arrogated vastly too 
much to themselves, and overstepped the bounds of truth, in 
claiming to be the onty propagators of the unitary conception 
of a God, as the following citations from historical authorities 
will clearly manifest : — 

1. Christians have a numerous cortege, or retinue, of angels 
in their s} T stem of inspired theology, as is shown in various parts 
of the Bible, which, in theological parlance, must be regarded 
as so mairy secondary Gods, inasmuch as the} 7 are assigned the 
same duties, perform the same functions, and sustain precisely 
the same relation to the supernal Deity as did the subordi- 
nate Gods of the pagans under the ancient systems. It is, in 
fact, only a change of name, in order to get rid of the illogical 



194 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

dilemma of holding to the existence of but one God, while vir- 
tually acknowledging the existence of many. We might cite 
man}' facts and testimonies from history in proof of this state- 
ment, but will restrict ourselves to one. Mr. Higgins says, 
" All nations believed in one supreme God, and many subordi- 
nates. The latter some termed angels ; others called them Gods. ' ' 
More anciently than the Jews, we find that the Bab}'lonians, 
Chaldeans, Persians, and Syrians all vested these subordinate 
beings with the properties of mere angels. " Angels," then, 
with Christians, we legitimately infer, is only another name 
for second-class Gods, or subordinate Deities of the Orientals. 

2. Even if we should pass over, as unworthy of considera- 
tion, the historical facts which go to identif}- the Christian 
angels with the subordinate Deities of the ancient pagans, there 
is 3'et spread out before us a broad and tenable ground for 
charging Christians with being polytheists, — that is, for re- 
jecting their pretensions of worshiping and preaching a unitary 
God ; for it is a ver} T striking and depreciating fact, that, not- 
withstanding their boastful and arrogating claims, there are 
many texts in the Old Testament which imply, in the most dis- 
tinct manner, a belief in a plurality of Gods. Indeed the 
first passage in the book, according to Mr. Parkhurst, would 
read, it" correctly translated, "In the beginning the Gods 
created the heavens and the earth," thus disclosing an acknowl- 
edgment of more than one God. And we find many other 
passages which are made to conceal the old polytheistic idea 
by a wrong translation. Fortunately, however, for the disclo- 
sure of truth, there are many texts in which it comes very dis- 
tinctly to the surface. As for example, In Genesis i. 26, we 
have the undisguised language, "Let us make man in our own 
image. 91 Now "us" and "our" being plural pronouns, it 
lid 1>(- lolly and nonsense to deny that they refer to a plural- 
ity of QodB. " Let ns make man " means. " Let usCiods make 
man;" for no sophistry, shifting, or dodging can make sens* 
Of it with any other construction. And several times, in this 
and oi her chapters, is similar language used. We will cut the 
matter short by observing, upon the authority of Parkhurst, 
that Aieim and Ehhim are the Hebrew plurals used to represent 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 195 

Gocl in the Old Testament ; that these are much more frequently 
employed than the singular forms, Al and El, thus disclosing 
the conception of a plurality of Gods beyond dispute. 

3. And this argumentation acquires additional logical strength 
when based on the fact that the Jews did not claim Jehovah as 
the only God, but merely as supreme to other Gods. He 
was " God of Gods" and "Lord of Lords." Nor was he 
claimed to be a God of any but the Jewish nation. Jethro is 
made to say, " Now I know that Jehovah is greater than all 
Gods " (Exod. xviii. 11). And in Exodus xv. 11 it is asked, 
1 ' Who is like unto Jehovah among the Gods ? ' ' Just such a 
claim as is put forth for Jupiter by Homer in his Iliad : — 

" O first and greatest God, by Gods adored, 

We own thy power-, oui Father and onr Lord ! ' ' 

Hence it will be observed, that if there were any merit or any 
honor in professing faith in a unitary Deity, or any truth form- 
ing a basis for such a claim, neither Jews nor Christians could 
justly arrogate a monopoly of such faith, inasmuch as there 
is an older claim to the doctrine. 

4. But we find that the professors of the Christian faith occupy 
still more untenable and more palpably erroneous ground than 
the Jews with respect to the profession of holding strictly to 
the unitary conception of Deity ; for they not only tacitly 
accept the contradictory phases of this doctrine, which we have 
pointed out above, in the Jewish writings, but they add thereto 
a new installment or chapter of errors by having accepted into 
their creed the old Oriental doctrine of a trinity of Gods. 
They have "God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy 
Ghost," which present us with a family of Gods as complete 
and absolute as the confederated union of Gods in either the 
ancient Hindoo or Grecian Pantheon. To allege, in defense, 
that these three Gods were all one, while we find each in various 
parts of the Bible spoken of separately, and discriminated by 
peculiar and distinct properties and titles, instead of mitigating 
the error and contradiction, such a plea only aggravates it. In 
the same sense the Hindoos claimed that their thousand Gods 
were one. And all the triads or trinities of Gods swarming 



196 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

through the ancient mythologies were proclaimed to be each 
u a trinity in unity;" so that such a defense only lands the 
professor of Christianity amongst heathen myths. 

5. The absurdity of the Christian Church in professing to 
worship a single God, also making a profession of rising above 
and contemning the idolatrous, polytheistic conception of Deity, 
culminates in their act of embodying and incorporating the infi- 
nite deityship in "the man Christ Jesus," and declaring him 
to possess " the fullness of the Godhead bodily." For we thus 
have one full and absolute God perambulating the earth in the 
person of Christ during his temporary sojourn here, while another 
absolute God (the Father) occupied the throne of heaven, thus 
presenting us with a plurality of Gods too marked and undis- 
guised to admit a rational defense. t A profession of monotheism 
arrayed with such facts bespeaks folly supreme. The polythe- 
ism of the ancient heathen is science and sense compared with 
such jargon. For, with all their Gods, they never paid divine 
honors, or prayed to but one God ("The Supreme Ruler") ; 
while Christians, on the contrary, worship all of theirs, — Father, 
Son, and Holy Ghost, — frequently naming each one separately 
in their supplications to the throne of grace, thus rendering 
themselves more open to the charge of polytheism, and that 
species of idolatry which consists in worshiping several Gods, 
than those whom they condemn as heathen for committing similar 
acts. We will prove this statement. The reverend missionaiy, 
]). (). Allen, sa}'s of a large bod}' of heathen professors, "They 
believe in the existence of beings whom they call Gods, but do 
not recognize them as possessing any qualities, or as having any 
agencies in human affairs, which properly make them objects 
of worship. They resemble the angels in the Christian system. 
Brahma with them is the supreme God, and all the other Gods 
offer him worship." It is evident, then, that they virtually wor« 
ship but one God, the inferior Deities being but angels j while 

us, on the contrary, have placed two, if not three. Cods 
on the throne. Which, then, have the best claim to be consid- 
ered monotheist 

6. And what sense, we would ask. can attach to the profes- 
sion of monotheism with such a Clod as the Bible sets forth, — 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 197 

a limited, local, personal God. No doctrine stands out more 
prominently as a fundamental tenet of the Christian faith than 
that which makes God appear a circumscribed, finite being. 
He is represented in their " inspired " book as possessing those 
qualities, properties, faculties, and functions which only a local, 
organized being can possess, — such as a bocly, head, eyes, nose, 
mouth, arms, fingers, feet, stomach, bowels, heart, &c. ; as 
eating, sleeping, walking, talking, riding, laboring, resting, 
laughing, crying ; and as getting angry and jealous, and cursing, 
swearing, smiting, fighting, &c, and on one occasion getting 
whipped or vanquished in a fight because the enemy were forti- 
fied with chariots of iron. (See Josh. 17-16.) And hardly 
was creation completed before he was down in Eden striding 
over the bushes, hunting for his lost child Adam, — the first sam- 
ple of the genus homo. And several times he had to leave his 
golden throne, and descend to earth before he could be posted 
in human affairs. 

Now it must be evident to any person possessing a moiety 
of common sense that such a limited, local, circumscribed 
being, limited in size, and restricted in powers and qualities as 
Jehovah is represented in the Bible to be, could neither be 
omnipotent, omniscient, nor omnipresent. True, Christians con- 
sider him so ; but the Bible fails to make him so. And hence 
there would be room in infinite space for countless millions of 
such Gods, and the doctrine of polytheism would be perfectly 
consistent. Indeed, such a dwarfish and circumscribed God 
would need thousands of such confederates to aid him in gov- 
erning the countless worlds of the vast universe ; so that the 
polytheistic doctrine from the Christian stand-point becomes a 
necessity, as it does also from another plane of view. We are 
told in Gen. i. that the w^ork of creation was completed in six 
days ; that the myriads of worlds which now chase each other 
through the sky were all rolled out of the vortex of infinitude in 
a week. But it is evident to every scientific or reflecting mind 
that a million of 3-ears would not have sufficed for the work, espe- 
cially for such a God as Moses describes and sets to the task. 
Hence the period of creation should be extended, or the number 
of Gods increased ad infinitum, to save the credibility of the 



198 



THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



cosmologic traditions. We would say, then, that, for the fol- 
lowing reasons, the more Gods Christians acknowledge, the 
better for the consistency of their cause : — 

1. Their conception of the Divine Essence is that of a local, 
limited, anthropomorphic, organized being, in exact conformity 
with the notion of the ancient pagans ; with which, in order to 
have every part of the infinite universe supplied, would require 
more in number than the most fertile imagination of the hea- 
then ever created. 2. A countless host of such finite Gods 
would have been required to complete the work of creation in 
six days. 3. There is room enough for any number of such 
finite Gods to exist without encroaching on each other's domin- 
ions. 4. There should have been at least one such God to be 
assigned the creation of each planetary world, which would re- 
quire many millions of creative entities. 5. And the superin- 
tendence of the endlessly complicated machinery of each planet, 
and the supply, specifically and individually, of the various wants 
of its swarming millions of diversified inhabitants, would require 
an infinite host more of such local Gods as Jehovah of the Jews. 
6. And, as Christians already practically acknowledge the wor- 
ship of three Gods, the addition of three hundred or three thou- 
sand more would onl} T be an extension of the principle, and could 
not be a whit more objectionable. For it is not any specific 
number of Gods they object to, but a " plurality ; " and three is 
as certainly and absolutely a plurality as three hundred or three 
thousand. From the above considerations, founded on views of 
consistency, we think Christians should ground their arms, and 
cease their moral warfare upon the votaries of other religions 
for being polytheistic or idolatrous. And "the sin of worship- 
ing many Gods," which they declaim so much on, is all a mere 
phantom. We can not see how the divine mind could possibly 
be offended at the simple mistake of overnumbering the God- 
head. We will illustrate the case. We will suppose a mer- 
chant in Cincinnati orders a bill of goods from New York, 
addressing the order to John Ap John & Co. The latter opens 
and examines it, then returns it unfilled, with the following 
quaint protest : "Sir, there is no ' Co.' attached to my address. 
It is simply John Ap John ; and you have insulted my dignity 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 199 

by this mistake, thus assuming that I have not the brain and 
bullion to do business on my own hook, but must have partners. 
I therefore return it with contempt for your insolent blunder." 
Now, we ask if there can be a man found who would be guilty of 
displaying such coxcomb vanity as this. We trow not. Then, 
wiry charge it upon an infinite God — an all- wise Deny — by 
supposing that a prayer addressed, by an innocent mistake, to a 
hundred or a thousand Gods would not be as acceptable to him 
as if addressed to him alone, or even if erroneously addressed 
to the Christian trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost? 

The Construction and Worship of Images. — In Exod. xx. 4 
we find the following command: " Thou shalt not make unto 
thee any graven image or any likeness of any thing that is in 
heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the 
water under the earth." Here, it will be observed, is a sweep- 
ing interdiction against image-making; and, as it prohibits 
" the likeness of any thing that is in heaven above or the earth 
beneath," it is a dead-lock upon the fine arts. All engravings, 
paintings, photographs, &c, with which the civilized world is 
now flooded, and which hold high rank among the arts and 
sciences, involve an open infraction of this command. And 
hence, this biblical interdiction being devoid of reason, and of 
an anti-civilizing tendency, the enlightened portion of Christen- 
dom, by common consent, tramples it heedlessly under foot. 
And we are bold to say that this command is both foolish and 
of impracticable application ; for a living, thinking human 
being can no more avoid forming Images of every thing that 
comes within the range of his mental vision, whether situated in 
heaven above or the earth beneath, than he can stop the entire 
machinery of his thoughts, or the blood from circulating through 
his veins. It is as natural as eating, and as inevitable as 
breathing. To be sure, he does not give expression with wood, 
metal, or canvas to every image formed in the mind ; but the 
nature of the act, morally speaking, is precisely the same as if 
he did. St. Clemens admits this when he declares it to be a 
sin for women to look in the glass, because the}' form images of 
themselves. All true ! viewed from the Christian stand-point, 
which regards image-making as a sin. The most sinful or rep- 



200 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

rehensible act of image-making, however, in the view of Chris- 
tians, is the construction of idols or images to represent the 
Deity. Living in a civilized age, they would be ashamed to 
occup}' the broad ground assumed by the command which we 
have quoted above, which forbids the likeness of every thing that 
exists ; yet they still hold that it is wrong to make images of 
the Deity, — not anymore so, according to the above command, 
than the acceptance of engravings of animals and photographs 
of friends. Bat where is the man now living, or when did the 
man live, who has not formed images of the Deity, or who does 
not instinctively and habitually do it every da}' of his life? 
Eve^ man makes a likeness of God, or what he supposes to be 
such, every time he thinks of such a being. It is impossible to 
make him the subject of thought without constructing a mental 
image of him, — i.e., without constructing an image of him in 
the brain. And can it be more sinful to make an image of 
him with the hand than with the head? — in other words, to 
construct a likeness of him externally, than to construct it 
internally. Certainly not. One is shaped out in the mind ; the 
other is shaped out of a block of wood or metal : and most cer- 
tainly, if the latter is idolatry, the former is also. The Chris- 
tian kneels in supplication with the image of God set up in his 
mind ; the pagan worships with the image set up in the temple 
or on the altar. One is externally represented with words ; the 
other, with wood. The only difference between the Christian 
and pagan idolatry is, that, after each has sketched out a like- 
ness of the Creator upon the tablet or dial-plate of his mind 
ording to his conception of the form of Deity, the Christian 
ps short with his work but half completed, while the pagan 
- on and gives practical expression to his by representing it 
with wood, Stone, or other material, by which it is more thor- 
oughly impressed upon the memory, and " the devout contem- 
plation." *• the remembrance of God," kept more constantly in 
the mind ; and thus the savage is proved to be the most practi- 
cally religious of the two. We have shown that the representa- 
tion and delineation upon canvas, paper, wood, or steel, of the 
various objects of art, — of human creation. — arc 4 set down as 
the highest marks and the most distinguishing proofs of civiliza- 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 201 

tion. And can it be right and laudable to thus represent or 
image the works of the Creator, and wrong to image the Creator 
himself? Not according to the above command. Or can one 
be pleasing to him, and the other offensive? There is neither 
sense nor science, logic nor lore, in such conclusions. Christian 
reader, do you not know that your little innocent daughter vio- 
lates the command ever} 7 day of her happy life by nursing, 
dressing, and caressing her wax doll, her image miniature man? 
For if it be true — and the Bible teaches it — that ' ' man was 
created in the image of God," then these artificial human like- 
nesses, these images of the infant man, are also images of God ; 
and 3'our little girl daily commits " the awful sin of idolatry," 
and you, too, for countenancing her in the act. It ma}^ be no- 
ticed here that the pious Christian confers upon himself an 
honor which he denies to the Creator when he has his photo- 
graph struck off for the accommodation of a friend, while he 
denounces as idolatry all attempts to construct an imaginary 
likeness of God. But consistency is a jewel rarely found. 

Image - Worship. — We may be met here with the answer that 
"it is not the making of images, but the worship of images, 
in lieu of the worship of God, that constitutes idolatry." To 
this we reply, we have no proof that any nation or people 
reported in history were ever obnoxious to the charge. True, 
the people of many countries have been in the habit of pros- 
trating themselves before idols in their daily worship. Yet in 
no case which we have examined do we find that those idols 
were worshiped with the thought of their being the true and 
living God, or of their being endowed with divine attributes, 
but only as t}^pes or representations of God. It is possible that 
some of the lower stratum of society — some of the debased and 
ignorant — may have been deluded into the idea that God had 
taken up his abode in those lifeless images. In fact we are 
assured that the priest, in some cases, labored to instill this 
belief into their minds. Some of them ma} 7 have been ignorant 
and pliable enough to be misled by his artful misrepresentation. 
But, by a large proportion of the idol- worshipers of every nation, 
we have the highest authority for asserting that these artificial 
images were not regarded as any thing more than the mere 



202 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

representation, or outward type, of the Deity, and were venerated 
with the same religious conviction which Christians experience 
in partaking of the bod}' and blood of Christ with the images of 
bread and wine, and without the suspicion of incurring the charge 
of idolatry. The two acts are precisely the same in spirit and 
essence. But the untutored denizens of the Pacific isles do not 
conceive that the dumb and lifeless sylvan figure before which 
they prostrate themselves in worship is the omnipotent, self- 
existent God, the Creator of heaven and earth, more truly than 
the Christians believe they are really eating and drinking " the 
body and blood of Christ" when partaking of the sacrament. 
They are both mere symbols, or representations, of something 
higher. It is irrational to suppose that beings endowed with 
minds believe that inanimate figures of gold, silver, iron, &c, 
possess omnipotent thought, power, and feeling. That able, 
pious Mahomedan writer, Abel Fezzel, declares (in his " Aren 
Akberry ' ' ) that c ' the opinion that the Hindoos (who make many 
idols) are idolaters has no foundation in fact ; but they are 
worshipers of God, and only one God." "This," says the 
modern traveler, Mr. Ditson of New York, " I know to be true ; 
fori had it from the lips of the Hindoos themselves." And 
this will apply with undiminished force to other nations habitu- 
ually styled idolaters. M Even the most savage nations," says 
Mr. Parker, u regard their idols only as types of God." And 
we might quote whole pages from heathen writers to that effect. 
Hie ancient Grecian poet. Ovid says, "It is Jove we adore in 
the image of God." "The Gods inhabit our minds and bod- 
ies," says Statins, a Latin writer, "and not the images made 
to represent them." Hence it is evident they had a perception 
of their true character. And the missionary, Rev. J). O. Allen, 
tells us that even those who have been represented as worship- 
ing the sun, moon, and stars, only contemplate these planets 
of the Deity, and that " their worship is really aimed 
to the Invisible, omnipotent, omnipresent God." It appears, 

then, that whatever external objects the most ignorant and 

I ribes have addressed, or have been supposed to worship, 

have been used merely as types and symbols to enhance their 
devotion in the worship of the true God. Though, as Cicero 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 203 

remarks (in his philosophical works) , " A few may have 
been so feeble in their perceptions as to confound and iden- 
tify the statues and Gods together.'' But another writer 
avers, ib There is not in all antiquity the least trace of a prayer 
addressed to a statue." He also says, u All paganism does not 
offer a single fact which can lead to the conclusion that they 
ever adored idols ; nor was there ever a law compelling them 
to do so." When Paul declared to the Athenians, u Whom ye 
ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you," he confessed most 
explicitly that they worshiped the true God through their idols. 
Where, then, is the sin of idolatry? 

In one of the Hindoo Bibles (the Baghavat Gita) God is 
made to say, " They who serve other Gods with a firm belief 
of being right do really involuntarily serve me, and shall be 
rewarded." How admirable, how noble, how magnanimous 
and merciful is this sentiment compared with the damning, death- 
dealing denunciations against idolatry by the Jewish Jehovah ! 
And the Mahomedan Bible (the Koran) contains a similar 
sentiment to the above. Thus, we observe, both the Hindoo 
and Mahomedan Bibles evince in this respect a higher degree 
of moral sense than that of the Christian Bible, whose violent 
interdictions against idolatry have caused many nations to be 
butchered, and their lands deluged with blood. " There is noth- 
ing in the Christian Bible," says Mr. Higgins, " of one-twentieth 
part of the value of this text of the Hindoo Bible in the way 
of preventing a foolish persecution and bloodshed." It may be 
remembered here that Christians inherited their extreme hatred 
of idolatry from the Jews, which is fostered by the Jewish 
Bible, and that the Jews derived their feelings of opposition to 
it from the two nations under which they were long enslaved, — 
the Persians and Egyptians, — both of which, according to 
Herodotus, forbid the making of idols, the former interdicting 
it by law ; as did also the Roman. emperor, Numa Pompilius, 600 
B.C. The Parsees of India to this day oppose idolatrj r ; and the 
learned among the Chinese have always discountenanced it. 
Strabo and other Grecian philosophers wrote against it. " And 
many sects arose among the ancient heathen," says the u Hiero- 
phant," " who rejected all external symbols of the Deity." On 



204 



TEE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



the other hand, neither Jews nor Christians have been entirely 
free from this "sin" so called. As for "the Lord's holy 
people,' ' there probably never was a nation who manifested a 
stronger or more invincible proclivity to idolatry than they, or 
who indulged more eagerly in the practice of it whenever oppor- 
tunity presented ; and frequently did they break over all re- 
straint to plunge into this seemingly enticing luxury, not even 
withholding their ear-rings when a molten image or golden calf 
was to be constructed. And even their lawgiver Moses con- 
sented to the construction of a number of imitations or substi- 
tutes for the carved images of the pagans. Their brazen 
serpent displayed upon a pole ; their carved cherubims with the 
body of a man, the head of an animal, and the wings of a bird ; 
and the ark of the covenant, which was borne about in the 
same manner the heathen carried their idols, — were all compro- 
mises with and concessions to idolatry, and were all venerated 
with the same spirit and in the same fashion the heathen adored 
their carved or molten images. As for the holy ark, the Jews 
as solemnly believed that God Almighty was shut up in that 
little box of shittim-wood as truly as ever the pagans believed 
that he sometimes condescended to a transient abode in their 
idols ; while it was death to touch it with " unholy hands," and 
sixty thousand were butchered because one man (the pious Uzza) , 
on a certain occasion, instinctively and devoutly clapped his 
hand on it to keep it from falling. In fact, the golden image 
which it contained was an idol to all intents and purposes; 
nor were the brazen serpent and cherubim of the altar much 
less SO. Hence the vindictive condemnation of other nations 
for making and adoring images came with an ill grace from 
the Jews. Nor arc the skirts of the disciples of Christ any 
freer from the stain of idolatry. In fact, it constitutes the very 
substratum of their religion. In the first place, the} 7 - quote 
approvingly such texts as the following: " The Lord is my 
rock" (Ps. xviii. 2); "Who is a rock save our God ?' ' (Ps. 
xviii. 31 ) ; ik The shepherd the stone of Israel " (Gen. xlix. 24). 
Peter calls him k * a living stone " (1 Pet. ii. 4). And there are 
a Dumber of other similar texts, all of which disclose real fetich- 
ism, or the first form of idolatry. The ancient Laplanders, 



PBOGBESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 205 

Arabians, Phoenicians, and several tribes of Asia Minor used 
rocks and stones as representative images of Deity. And here 
we find the same association of ideas in the Christian Bible. 
Do you reply, u They must be considered figurative"? Very 
well : prove that the ancient heathen tribes did not also consider 
them figurative. 

But we have a much more serious and conclusive proof than 
this that nearly the entire retinue of Christian professors are 
practical idolaters, and that their " holy religion," in all its 
essential characteristics, comprises, in its very nature, the high- 
est species of idolatry. Some Christian professors tell us that 
those who worship idols must have a limited conception of the 
character and attributes of the Deity ; thus conceding that idol- 
atr}^ consists in ascribing to God a false character. Well, now, 
this is the very objection which we would urge as one of the 
first, and one of the most serious charges against the Christian 
s} T stem. It presents us with a cramped, dwarfish, and childish 
conception of Deity. In the first place, the disciples of Chris- 
tianity still cling to the old tradition, which they inherited from 
the heathen, of investing God with the form and characteristics 
of a man. For if the Deity possesses the human form, as they 
and their Bible teach, then he must possess the human character- 
istics, — a logical sequence, which science defies all Christendom 
to overturn, as it is the infallible testimony of the natural his- 
tory of all time that nothing can possess the form of one being 
and the characteristics of another. As is form, so is and must 
be the character, is an axiom supported by numberless proofs 
of daily and hourly observation. Hence, Jesus Christ possess- 
ing, according to the scriptures, the form of a man, — u the form 
of a servant," - — must inevitably have possessed the character of 
a man. Hence we are not surprised to find, that, in spite of the 
combined efforts of his evangelical biographers to make him a 
God (if the}' are really to be understood as designing to ele- 
vate him to the Godhead) , his finite human qualities are dis- 
played in his history in every chapter. Every saying and every 
credible incident of his life prove him to have been a man, not- 
withstanding some of them are apparently set forth as prima- 
facie evidence of his being a God. Therefore the conclusion 



206 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

that, as Jesus Christ had the form of a man, he could not have 
been a God ; and to worship him as sueh was and is idolatry in 
the highest and fullest sense. And, besides the form, there are 
other evidences of his having been a man. He walked, talked, 
ate, slept, wept, shed tears, &c, and finally died just as other 
men do. And, furthermore, he believed and taught some of the 
traditions and superstitions of finite, ignorant men, — such as a 
vengeful God, an endless hell, disease produced by demons, a 
personal devil, the speedy conflagration of the world, &c. Thus 
we have a threefold proof of his manhood, and disproof of his 
Godhead, and a proof that those who worship him are idolaters. 
And as the primitive or primordial Bible God Jehovah is rep- 
resented as possessing, as we have already shown, a compre- 
hensible body, eyes, nose, mouth, hands, arms, legs, feet, 
bowels, &c, and as being a jealous, angry, revengeful, fighting 
God (the God of battles), and inferior in several respects to 
some of the men who worshiped him, such worship is conse- 
quently idolatry. We observe, then, that the Jews worshiped one 
idol (Jehovah) ; and the Christians, three (" Father, Son, and 
Holy Ghost "), — the two former possessing the form of man, 
and the latter the form of a bird (a dove) . There is exactly 
the same objection, and it is to exactly the same extent idol- 
atry, to worship Jesus Christ as to worship Chrishna, Confu- 
cius, Mahomet, or airy of the wooden Gods or graven images 
of the idolatrous pagans. In each case it is assuming that God, 
instead of being eternally infinite in all his attributes, has 
been invested with the finite, limited, and comprehensible form 
of man. to say nothing of the corresponding finite qualities 
which his worshipers have assigned him. And this narrow, 
childish assumption, with its attendant conceptions, keeps the 
mind Of the worshiper in an intellectually cramped and dwarf- 
condition, besides perpetuating their dishonorable and dis- 
paraging news of Deity. And herein lies the great objection 
to Idolatry. [f any of these venerated beings could possess 
divine attributes, there would he less moral objection to wor- 
shiping them as Gods. The error is not in ascribing divine 
attributes to the wrong being, but in the conception of wrong 
qualities and attributes as comprehensible in a divine being. 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 207 

For God is not possessed of the vanity to be offended by the 
simple mistakes of men and women directing their prayers and 
devotions to another being or object instead of to him. The 
grand error consists in mistaking the real character and attri- 
butes of Deity ; that is, in constructing false images of him, — 
whether mental or material is all the same. In other words, 
idolatry consists in worshiping, for God, beings or objects pos- 
sessing finite forms, with whom, consequently, infinite and divine 
attributes could not be properly associated, and through whom 
they could not possibly be displayed. And so self-evident was 
the proof that these beings, possessing the form, size, and 
plrysical outline of men, and presenting ever} 7 appearance of 
men (as Christ, Chrishna, Confucius, &c), were nothing but 
men, that even those who were habitually taught to adore them 
as the supreme, omnipotent Deity, naturally and instinctively, 
in their intercourse with them and their descriptions of them, 
invested them with human qualities as well as divine. And 
thus they came to present to the world the awkward and ludi- 
crous figure of beings displaying both finite and infinite attri- 
butes, — i.e., of being demi-gods, half God and half man. 
This is especially true of "the man Christ Jesus." And it 
may be safety assumed as an incontrovertible proposition, that 
just so long as men are in the habit of worshiping beings in 
the human form, whether Jehovah or Jesus Christ, or beings 
possessing any conceivable form as the great "I am," just so 
long will they entertain, to their own injury and to the disgrace 
of religion, inferior and dishonorable views of God. They 
must learn that a finite body can not contain an infinite spirit, 
nor possess an infinite attribute ; and that to worship an object 
or being known to possess or even supposed to possess any con- 
ceivable form, size, or shape within the comprehension of man, 
whether the materials composing this adored object or being are 
gold, silver, wood, brass, iron, or flesh and blood (as in the case 
of Jesus Christ) , constitutes the highest species of idolatry. 
It can make no difference what the materials are, as it is just as 
impossible to associate divine and infinite attributes with an 
image of flesh and blood or a finite body, as to associate them 
with an image of wood, stone, or metal. All is alike idolatry. 



208 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

The Christian world have an image or idol, constructed in 
part of flesh and blood, restricted, as they tell us, to a spiritual 
body, which they call Jesus Christ, and which they place upon 
an imaginary throne situated in or above the clouds, and wor- 
ship it as God ; while the Babylonians had the same image 
carved from wood and metal, which they called Dagon, and set 
upon a throne in the temple : and, in both cases, we are told, by 
way of apology, that it was not the external form, or outward 
bod} T , which constituted the divinity, but the spirit within. Now, 
as there is room in infinite space for millions of such beings 
(such finite Gods), there could be no moral objection to mul- 
tiplying their number, and worshiping as many of them as the 
imagination could conjure up, or the polytheist's fancy could 
create. We worship none but the infinite God ; the living, 
moving, all-pervading, and all-energizing spirit of the infinite 
universe, who has no finite or comprehensible bod} 7 , and never 
had ; and hence, being infinite in extent and in all his attri- 
butes, but one such being can possibly exist, and monotheism 
thus becomes a virtue and a necessity. We will only remark 
further, that the man who can worship a being with the human 
form or any form as the infinite God, no matter if he swells 
his proportions by imagination to the size of the planet Jupiter 
or the whole solar system, } r et still, as this is not one step of an 
approach toward infinitude or omnipresence, his conceptions of 
Deity are puerile, childish, belittling, and dishonorable, if not 
blasphemous. If there is such a thing as blasphemj', it is 
found here. And his ignorance of the essential characteris- 
tics of an infinite being, or the scientific view of God, is on a 
par with the child's ignorance of astronomy, who exclaims, 
M Give me the moon ! " Here we desire to apprise the reader 
more distinctly that we do not regard idolatry as a crime or 
blameworthy act in those who originated it, but actually useful 
when restricted to its legitimate uses. To those groveling in 
spiritual darkness, on the lower plane of religions development, 
it la as " eves to the blind, and crutches to the lame. ,, It is 
only in those, who, like Christians, profess to be enlightened, 
that it becomes a culpable act. Several writers have shown 
that idols were really practically useful, in a religious point of 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 209 

view, in the primitive spiritual condition of mankind, and are 
yet so to the lower classes in various countries ; that is, to 
those who dwell upon the sensorial plane, and whose spiritual per- 
ceptions are hence too feeble to soar to an ethereal world to find 
the great object of spiritual worship. The learned Hindoo, 
Roh Mun Roy, who wrote a work against idolatry, and who 
condemned the Christian churches for 4 ' worshiping an idol in 
the person of Jesus Christ," beautifully sets forth the true na- 
ture and purpose of idolatry when he says (after stating that 
idols were not made for the learned) , 4 ' The Vedas [Hindoo 
Bible] directs those who are spiritually incapable of adoring the 
invisible Supreme Being to apply their minds to some visible 
object as an external manifestation of the only true God, rather 
than lose themselves in the mazes of irreligion, the bane of 
society. As God exists everywhere, and pervades everything 
(even idols), such means were mercifully provided for the 
ignorant and untrained to lead them on to true mental adora- 
tion and spiritual worship." And thus idols were used as 
aids and stepping-stones to the true worship for those who were 
mentally incapable of raising their minds from ' ' nature up to 
nature's God," as taught by this heathen writer. Thus they 
served the same purpose as pictures do for children, and were 
equally innocent and useful. It is, therefore, no more sinful to 
be an idolater than to be a child. In fact, idolatry was a neces- 
sity of man's religious nature. The Vedas makes God say, ' ' The 
ignorant believe me visible while I am invisible." The able, 
pious Abel Fezzel (a Mahomedan writer) says, in his u Aren 
Akberry," " The Brahmins and Hindoos all believe in the unity 
of the God-head ; yet they hold images in high veneration, be- 
cause they represent celestial beings, and prevent the mind from 
wandering." Swedenborg says in like manner, " The heathen 
kept images not only in their temples, but in their houses, not 
to worship them, but to call to mind the heavenly being the}^ 
represented." Thus it will be observed that the idol was the 
sanctuary where man, in his childhood, met to commune with 
his God, just as the Christian now seeks his spiritual presence 
at the communion-table or the altar. The pagan, who was a 
child in religious experience, was morally necessitated to have 



210 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

a God, or representation of God, he could see, feel, and handle. 
And it is remarkable that the Christian world, after two thou- 
sand years' religious experience, still occupy the same plane, — 
are still pagans or children with respect to believing in visible 
external Gods, as they virtually worship two, Jehovah and Jesus 
Christ, who, according to the teaching of their Bible and their 
established creeds, were often seen in the human form, and 
one of them with a human body. Thus it will be observed they 
have not outgrown or advanced beyond the essential principle 
of idolatry, — that of worshiping a visible or imaginary form for 
an invisible God, who, the "positive philosophy" teaches, 
never has been and never can be seen under any circumstances, 
because, being omnipresent (that is, present everywhere, and 
everywhere alike), if he could be seen at all, he could be 
seen at all times and in all places. This is a self-evident, axi- 
omatic truth. 

Origin of Idolatry. — Here we deem it proper to speak more 
directl}' and specifically of the primary origin of idolatry, or 
image- worship, than is disclosed in the preceding pages. After 
the primitive inhabitants of the earth had conceived the notion 
that the sun, moon, and stars are moved in their orbits through 
the heavens by beings who occupied them (as has already been 
shown) , they were in the habit of gazing upon these tower- 
lights of the Elysian fields (the home of the Gods) with the 
most intense delight, the most reverential awe and devotion. 
But ever and anon this pleasing reverie was interrupted, and 
subjected to sad suspense, by w the departure of the heavenly 
host to Other and distant lands. " First of all. the solar God, 
mounted upon his gem-wheeled chariot drawn by his licet steeds, 
after plowing his way through the deep-blue vault of the sky. 
was oil' on his swift-sped journey behind the western hills, but 
followed almost immediately by the whole retinue of stellar orbs 
(the homes of the lesser Cods), who danced along in his wake ; 
but. ever true to the line of march, followed on apace, and 
were soon beyond the bounds of human vision. This left an 
aching void ID their devout minds. Hence the invention and 
enn-tnirtioii of images as imaginary likenesses of the Cods, to 
serve M >ul»titutcs for them, to be venerated in their stead 



PROGRESSIVE IDEAS OF DEITY. 211 

during their absence, as we secure the likeness of a friend when 
about to leave us for a journey, or to be long absent. And 
here we may date the primary origin of idolatry, which is noth- 
ing more nor less than the first rude germination of man's 
religious nature. 

II. All Christians Atheists or Idolaters. 
It seems most strikingly strange that atheism and idolatry 
should be considered by the orthodox representatives of the 
Christian faith as ' 4 the most Gocl-defying and heaven-daring sins 
that man can be guilty of" (as one Christian writer represents 
them to be) , when there is not a professor of the Christian faith, 
and never has been, who was not guilty most unquestionably 
of one of these sins. It requires but a few words to prove this 
statement. Nearly all the early Christian writers defined atheism 
to be " disbelief in a personal God," and idolatry as u image- 
making." How obtuse must have been their perceptions that 
they could not see that their definition of these terms made 
them all either atheists or idolaters, and that it is impossible 
to escape one of these charges without becoming obnoxious to 
the other ! No person can believe in a personal God without 
forming an image of him in the mind ; and this is just as much 
idolatry as though that mental image should find expression in 
wood or stone or brass, as shown in the preceding chapter. 
On the other hand, to believe in an infinite and spiritual God, 
instead of a personal God, is, as shown above, atheism. It will 
be seen, then, to believe in a personal, organized Deity is, to 
all intents and purposes, idolatry ; while to reject this anthro- 
pomorphic and sensuous idea, and accept the belief in a spiritual 
Gocl in its stead, is atheism. And thus the position is reduced 
to a demonstrated problem, that all Christians are either athe- 
ists or idolaters. 



212 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

NEW-TESTAIENT ERRORS. 

I. Divine Revelation Impossible and Unnecessary. 

The Hindoos, Egyptians, Persians, Chaldeans, Jews, and 
Mahomedans, and various other nations, claim to have had a 
special revelation of God's will communicated to them for the 
benefit of the whole human race. But the following facts and 
arguments will tend to show that no such revelations have ever 
been made, and that there is none necessary : — 

We will inquire, in the first place, what a divine revelation 
would be. Coming from a perfect being, it would of course be 
perfect, and perfectly adapted to the moral and spiritual wants 
of the whole human race. Such a revelation would be so clear, 
explicit, and unequivocal in its language with respect to every 
doctrine, principle, and precept, and every statement of fact, 
that no person of ordinary mind could possibty misunderstand 
it ; and no two persons could differ for a moment with respect 
to the meaning of any text embraced in it. It would need no 
priest and no commentator to explain it; and, if any attempt 
should be made to explain it, it would only " darken counsel," 
render the matter more obscure, and would amount to the blas- 
phemous assumption that Omniscience can be enlightened, and 
his works Improved. And a divine revelation should be com- 
municated to the whole human race; for, if restricted to one 
nation, it would render God obnoxious to the charge of par- 
tiality. And. in order to make it practicable to communicate it 
to all nations, it would be necessary to comprehend it in a uni- 
versal language constructed tor the purpose, or else impart it to 
the world through all the three thousand languages in use by 

different nations and tribes. But, as such a revelation has never 
been made or known on the earth, it is at once evident that 



NEW-TESTAMENT ERRORS. 213 

no such revelation has ever been communicated to man by Infi- 
nite Wisdom. 

II. Revelation for One Age and Nation no Revelation 

for Another. 

A revelation issued two or three thousand years ago could 
be no revelation for this age. The Rev. Jeremiah Jones admits 
that u a revelation can only be a revelation to him who receives 
it," and can not be made use of to convince another (Canon, 
p. 51). Bishop Burnet admits that a revelation to one man 
is no revelation to another. You can neither see nor feel a 
revelation made to another person. You can merely see the 
marks on the paper on which he has recorded what he claims to 
have been a revelation to him. And this is all the proof }'ou 
can have in the case, which is no proof at all. 

III. A Revelation on the Brain called Reason. 

I know that God has inscribed a revelation on my brain called 
reason, as it is ever present with me. Hence I know that it 
was designed for me. But I can not have this testimony with 
regard to a written revelation, as it was not communicated to 
me. Hence, as a matter of certainty and safety, I should 
hold to nry own revelation in preference to any other. 

I can only be certain of my own revelation. Indeed I can 
not know that any other revelation was designed for me, because 
a dozen revelations are brought forward by different nations for 
nry acceptance ; and I can not determine to an absolute certainty 
which is divine and which is human. To settle the matter, I 
must have another revelation made expressly to me to inform 
me which is the true revelation. To save this extra labor, I 
might as well have had the original revelation itself. 

IV. The Human Brain Superior to any Revelation. 

As an idiot can not be made to understand a revelation, it is 
evident that a revelation presupposes a rational mind for its 
reception ; otherwise the revelation would be perfectly useless. 
Hence it is evident the brain must be right before the revela- 
tion is given, or it will not be able to understand it. This 



214 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

makes the brain superior to, and of higher authority, than reve- 
lation. 

The moment we begin to reason on the revelation of the 
Bible, which we are compelled to do to determine which is the 
true one, that moment we transfer the authority of the Bible to 
the brain, and the brain thus becomes its judge and jury. The 
reason sits in judgment over the Bible, and is thus proved to be 
superior to it. This is realized in the experience of every man 
who is superior to an idiot ; and thus the question of Bible 
authority and superiority is at once and for ever settled. It is 
proved to be inferior to reason, and subordinate to it, and dare 
not advance a step beyond it. 

V. Infallible Revelation Impossible. 

A Bible or revelation could only be infallible to a man or 
woman of infallible understanding ; that is, to an infallible 
being. And, as no such being has ever existed, it is evident 
that no infallible revelation has ever been issued. 

VI. Every Thing must be Infallible. 

No infallible revelation could be of any practical use to 
any person unless all the circumstances connected with it were 
infallible. The language in which it is written must be infal- 
lible ; the person receiving it must be infallible ; and the reader, 
or his understanding, must also be infallible. But, as no such 
state of things has ever existed, it follows that no infallible 
revelation has ever been given to man, and is absolutely imprac- 
ticable. 

VII. No Divine Revelation without a Series of Miracles. 
A divine revelation must be miraculously inspired ; and then 
it must l»e miraculously preserved from the slightest alteration 
by the translator or the transcriber, and from any error on 
the pari of the printer. And, finally, the reader's mind and 
understanding and judgment must be miraculously guarded 
from any mistake or misunderstanding or wrong conclusions 
relative i<> every text in the book. Otherwise there is no abso- 
lute certainty that the revelation is a true one, or superior to a 
mere human production. 



NEW-TESTAMENT EBBOBS. 215 

VIII. Our Moral and Religious Duties can not be learned 
from any Bible or Revelation. 
A critical investigation of the matter will show that our moral 
and religious duties are not half of them enumerated in the 
Bible ; and to suppose that God would reveal only a portion 
of them, and leave us in the dark with respect to others, and 
compel us to find them out by chance and conjecture, is to trifle 
with Omniscience, and assume that he is short-sighted and im- 
perfect. 

IX. No Moral Duty clearly defined by the Blble. 

As the circumstances of each case of moral duty differ from 
every other case, so our courses of action must be different. 
Hence revelation, to be of any practical use, should have fore- 
seen those circumstances, pointed them out, and instructed us 
how to act in the case. But this is not done in any case. We 
will illustrate : We are enjoined by the Bible to ' 6 bring up a child 
in the way he should go ; " but that way is not pointed out or 
defined. We are not told which one of the thousand churches he 
should join ; we are not told, when a man's leg is broken, how 
it should be mended ; we are not told what means we should use 
to restore the sick to health, nor instructed as to the best means 
to be used for the preservation of health and life. And, as 
these are among the first and most important duties, we should 
have been instructed as to the best means to be used for that 
purpose ; but these things are omitted, and left to the province 
of reason. There is no case in which we are not compelled to 
make reason our supreme judge to decide how we shall practice 
the duties of revelation ; and thus revelation is made a servant 
or subsidiary agent. 

Christians sometimes tell us, " Give us something better in the 
place of our religion before you take it from us." But the Bible 
tells them, " Cease to do evil [before you] learn to do well." 
Doom error to destruction, and truth will spring out of the 
ashes. What would you think of a man who should say to a 
physician, "Stop, sir! before you administer that medicine to 
my child, I want to know what you are going to let it have in 



216 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

place of its pains and aches " ? We do not propose or desire to 
destroy any religion as a whole, but only the deleterious weeds 
which are choking and poisoning the healthy plants. We do 
not wish to put clown or arrest the progress of any truth. 

The clergy sometimes assert that ' ' we could not distinguish 
right from wrong, but for the Bible." And was nothing known 
to the world about right and wrong, or the means of distin- 
guishing between them, during the two thousand years which 
elapsed before the Bible was written? Christians place Moses, 
its first writer, about fourteen hundred years before Christ, 
while the Bible dates back 4004 B.C. And then what about 
those millions of the inhabitants of the globe who never had 
our Bible ? And millions of them never had a Bible of any kind. 
Are they destitute of moral perception ? On the contraiy, reliable 
authority, and even Christian writers, assure us that the morals 
of many of those nations will put to shame the morals of any 
nation professing the religion of Christ. Take, for example, 
the Kalaos tribe of Africa, who appear to have no formal re- 
ligion whatever ; and yet, as Dr. Livingstone informs us, 
they maintain strict honesty in all their dealings with each 
other, and have made considerable progress in the arts and 
manufactures. They have never had a Bible or revelation of 
any kind. Look also at the inhabitants of the Arm Islands. 
" These people," sa}^s Dr. Livingstone, " appear to have no 
religion whatever ; and yet they live in brotherty peace, and 
respect each other's rights," — the rights of property in the fullest 
sense. The Rev. W. II. Clark, speaking of the Yoruba nation 
in Central Africa, says, u Their moral and even their civil rights 
in sonic respects would put to shame any Christian nation in the 
world." We might present a hundred more cases of this kind ; 
but these three cases are sullicient to show that nations with no 
Bible, no revelation, and even no religion, transcend any Chris- 
tum nation with respect to strict honesty and a practical sense 
of right niid wrong. How absurd, therefore, is the idea shown 
to l»e. thai a knowledge of the Christian Bible is essential to 
the knowledge and practice of good morals ! (See chap. 30.) 



NEW-TESTAMENT EBBOBS. 217 

X. Our Duties are All recorded in the Bible of Nature. 

There is not a moral or religious duty that is not inscribed on 
the tablet of man's soul or consciousness which he would not soon 
learn if his attention were not constantly directed to, and his mind 
occupied with, the erroneous theories of the dark, illiterate ages. 
The God of nature has endowed every human being with two 
sensations, — one of pleasure, and the other of pain, — which 
serve as guides in all his actions, both physical and moral. 
They stand as sentinels at the door of his soul to warn him 
of the approach of evil of every kind. The moment their king- 
dom is invaded, they raise an alarm, which he soon learns he 
must heed or suffer a penalty. If he drinks intoxicating drinks, 
or improperly indulges his appetites and propensities in any 
way, he learns, by suffering, that is the penalty affixed to the 
violation of the law of health, and that he can not escape it, and 
that no one can suffer for him, or make any " atonement for 
his sins." If he attempts to handle fire, he is soon apprized that 
he is meddling with something that will injure him ; if he com- 
mits a moral wrong against a neighbor, it re-acts upon himself in 
various ways, as explained in Chap. 46. It thus acts as a 
two-edged sword, which cuts both ways, punishes both the vic- 
tim and the perpetrator. Man learns by experience that crime 
will not only injure him, but, in many cases, will destroy him. 
On the other hand, when he practices virtue, she greets him with 
her smiles, and fills his soul with pleasure. Let me illustrate : 
The bells in some city toll the alarm of fire at midnight. In a 
few minutes thousands of men and boj^s are congregated on the 
spot, many of them half-dressed, and without hats or shoes, 
in order to aid a fellow-being in rescuing his dwelling from the 
all-devouring element. What prompts them to this act? It is 
not an injunction of their Bible. No : it was the well-spring 
of philanthropy leaping up through' their souls that prompted to 
the deed, and not a written Bible. Again': why is a mother's 
loving, watchful care ever exercised for the protection and wel- 
fare of her child? She will endure almost any hardship or 
privation which its welfare requires. Why does she do this? 
Her Bible is silent on the subject. It is the impulse of nature 



218 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

welling up from the fountain of maternal affection which prompts 
to these acts of loving care, — to this moral duty. And this is 
true of all the other moral duties of life. They are all imbibed at 
her fountain, — at the fountain of Nature. A man with a good 
moral development needs no revelation to teach him what is 
right, no Bible to prompt him to the performance of his duties. 
We rejoice "with joy unspeakable" that the world is fast 
learning this moral axiom. The Bible truly teaches us that our 
moral duties are revealed in the book of nature (Chap. 14). 
And Christian writers also admit this. Tertullian says, u Why 
pain yourselves in searching for a divine law while }^ou have that 
which is common to mankind, and engraven upon the tablet 
of nature ? ' ' This is a wonderful admission for a Christian writer 
to make, as it virtually concedes there is no moral or religious 
necessity for a written Bible or revelation. 

XI. A Divine Revelation adverse to Human Progress. 

One argument against the belief in a divine revelation is 
found in the fact that it would tend to paralyze human effort, 
and thus make man a mental sloth. If a man could find all his 
moral and religious duties " cut and dried," and laid out before 
him, he would be thus robbed of the motive to study and learn 
his duties by the exercise of his mental powers. And having 
no incentives to healthy, energetic action, he would become a 
drone and mental sloth. We can not believe God ever made 
such a blunder as this. 

XIT. A Divine Revelation would imply Imperfection on 
the Pabt of Deity. 

It is admitted that no revelation was ever given to man for 

more than two thousand years after creation. This would imply 
that it was forgotten by Infinite Wisdom, or else the moral ne- 

Efity I<>r it overlooked. Either assumption would make God 
an imperfect and short-sighted being. It would appear like an 
after-thought. After man had lived so many years upon the 
earth, it jusl occurred to GrOd that he had not given him a 
written revelation instructing him what to do and believe. The 

omption of a divine revelation presupposes such a blunder 



PBIMEVAL INNOCENCY OF MAN NOT TBUE. 219 

as this on the part of Omniscience, and is therefore derogatory 
to his character. 

Now, we ask seriously, Do not the foregoing facts and argu- 
ments show that there is no moral or religious necessity for a 
divine revelation to man ? Let the believers in the necessity of 
the Bible, or a divine revelation, show their fallac}', or for ever 
abandon the old mythological assumption that it is necessary. 

Another conclusive argument : A mind that could comprehend 
a truth divinely revealed could originate that truth. We will 
give an illustrative proof : A teacher works out a mathematical 
problem on the blackboard for the benefit of his school. Now, 
every teacher and every logical mind will admit that every 
pupil, possessing the mental capacity to understand the mathe- 
matical truth thus revealed, could, by his own unaided powers, 
have clev eloped it himself sooner or later. In like manner, the 
mind that could comprehend a truth revealed from God, could 
originate it without the aid of revelation. Hence revelation 
would be worse than useless, as it would furnish a pretext for 
mental or intellectual sloth, and thus have a tendency to stop 
human progress by doing for us what we could and should do 
ourselves. A logical investigation of the case will show that 
we possess the mental capacity to discover every truth tve need, 
whether it be scientific, moral, or religious; and such exercise 
furnishes the only means to keep the mind in a healthy con- 
dition. And thus the problem is proved again. 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

PEIIEVAL INNOCENCY OF IAN NOT TEUE. 

The tradition so universally prevalent among the disciples of 
all the Oriental s} T stems of religious faith, as well as those of a 
more modern origin, and which is still a conspicuous element 
of the Christian sj^stem, — that man commenced his career in a 
state of moral perfection, — is so obviously at war with ever}^ 
principle of anthropology, and every page of human histoiy 
tending to demonstrate the moral character of the primitive 



220 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

inhabitants of the earth, that I shall employ but little time and 
space in exposing its absurdity and falsity. 

1. All the organic remains of the earliest types of the human 
species that have been found demonstrate conclusively that 
man started on the animal plane with animal feelings, propen- 
sities, and habits, almost totally devoid of moral feelings, and 
consequent!}' a victim to his passions, propensities, and lusts. 
Where, then, were his moral purity and angelic holiness? The 
idea is a mere chimera. 

2. It is now a settled problem in mental science that the 
character of ever} 7 species of animate being corresponds with 
its organization ; that the organic structure of the being, whether 
dead or alive, always indicates its true character. If it pos- 
sesses the form and type of the tiger, it will alwa^^s be found 
with the disposition and habits of the tiger ; or, if it is a sheep 
in form, it will be a sheep in character. There is no deviation 
from this rule. Hence, when we find the bones of the early types 
of the human species resembling those of the lower order of 
animals, there is no escaping the conclusion that they possessed 
an analogous character. 

3. Look, then, at the fact that the skulls and facial bones of 
human beings, found embedded in the rocks of Gibraltar, be- 
longing to a race which naturalists have decided existed upon 
the earth sixty-five thousand 3-ears ago, closely approximate 
those of an animal. They possessed retreating foreheads, prog- 
nathous jaws, extremely coarse features, and skulls nearly an 
inch in thickness ; hands resembling those of a monkey, feet 
resembling those of a bear, and cranial receptacle showing a 
very small amount of moral brain. Now, it is evident that this 
early nice, with such a gross, brutal organization, could not 
have possessed line moral sensibilities and lofty virtue, purity, 
and perfection. 

4. And we find that nations whose organizations indicate a 
higher moral character are of more modern origin, as shown by 
their organic remains being found in more recently formed 

ita, — the tertiary formation. It is thus scientifically demon- 
strated thai man's tendency toward moral perfection is inversely 
to the remoteness of time, — that, the nearer we retrace his 



PEIMEVAL INNOCENCT OF MAN NOT TRUE. 221 

history to his origin, the lower position he occupies in the scale 
of morals. 

5. We will cite one more historical fact to establish this 
theory. The existence of a tribe of negroes has been traced 
(as stated in Chap. 16.) to near the date of Noah's flood, 
whose organization indicates a very near approach to the animal ; 
thus showing, that, if they are descendants of Adam, he himself 
must have possessed an inferior or defective moral organization 
and character. 

6. Let the reader, after noting these facts, read the history 
of the practical lives of the earliest races or nations whose 
deeds have been recorded, and he will find they sustain the 
same proportion ; that their defective moral character corre- 
sponds (ceteris paribus) to the remoteness of the era in which 
they lived. The history of the Jews themselves illustrates and 
corroborates the proposition, as the character of the modern 
Jews is far superior to those of the era of Abraham and 
Moses. 

7. Once more : The fact that the moral character of nearly 
all nations is constantly improving, proves beyond question that 
man once occupied a much lower plane, and that, instead of 
falling from a state of moral purity, he is constantly ascending 
toward that condition. 

8. The current belief of man's primitive moral perfection is 
easily traced to its origin. Nearly all the Oriental nations had 
a tradition of a " golden age," when the most sublime and 
unalloyed bliss was the lot and enjojinent of the genus homo. 
But the serpent that beguiled Eve to eat of the forbidden fruit 
in Eden, the serpent who stole the recipe of immortal life in As- 
Byria, the entering of Typhon into the golden paradise of Osirus 
in Egypt, the opening of Pandora's box in Greece, the piercing 
of the evil egg by Ahrimanes in Chaldea, the machinations of 
the snake in India, of the lizard in Persia, and the demon in 
Mexico, seem to have all had an agency in defeating the omni- 
scient designs of Deity, and placing the reins of government in 
the hands of the world's omnipresent, omnipotent, and omni- 
scient evil genius, thus prostrating for ever the great and glorious 
plans of Infinite Wisdom. 



222 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER XXXV. 

ORIGINAL SIN AND FALL OF MAN. 

Having shown that man commenced his earthly career on a 
low moral and intellectual plane, and that therefore the as- 
sumption of his original moral perfection is a fallacy, the cor- 
relative dogma of his fall into a state of moral depravity falls to 
the ground of its own weight. It would be a w^ork of superero- 
gation to attempt to show that man never fell in a moral sense, 
after having shown that he never occupied an elevated moral 
position to fall from. It is self-evident that he could not fall 
if there was no lower position for him to fall to ; and this has 
been shown. Nevertheless we will expose its absurdity from 
other logical stand-points. According to the Westminster Cate- 
chism, " God placed man in the garden of Eden, and forbade 
him to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge ; and, because 
he disobeyed, he became the victim of God's eternal wrath, an 
accursed and totally depraved being." Such doctrine is not only 
morally revolting, but replete with logical absurdities. We will 
recount sonic of them: — 

1. God formed and fashioned man, according to the Bible, 
after his own image, the product of his infinite wisdom ; and if 
he had not possessed infinite wisdom, which must enable him to 
do every thing to perfection, lie had had an eternity to study 
the matter, and get it fully matured, so as to make every thing 
work in harmony, and endow every sentient being with hap- 
pine 

2. And, as happiness is the highest end and aim of every 
living being, it is henee evident that, where there is a want of 
happiness, there Is a want of perfection in the being who estab- 
lished such a state Of tilings ; and such a being could not by 
any possibility be infinitely good and infinitely wise. 



ORIGINAL SIN AND FALL OF MAN. 223 

3. A few points considered will show very- cle arty, that, if 
man sinned and fell, God has to sustain the responsibility of it. 
We are told that God made man ; and, being all- wise, he would, 
of course, endow him with exactly such faculties and inclina- 
tions and appetites as were best adapted to his situation, and 
calculated to make him happy. But, according to orthodoxy, 
God had planted a tree near the spot where he placed Adam, 
and furnished it with some beautiful and luscious fruit, and 
implanted in man an appetite and relish for it, and, as if to 
tantalize him with perpetual hanger, forbade him to eat the 
fruit ; and apparently; for fear Adam would obey his command 
and abstain from eating the fruit, he created a serpent-devil to 
persuade him (or rather his wife) with bland smiles (assuming 
that a snake can smile , which is rather doubtful) to partake of 
the fruit, and satisfy their appetites. All this appears to have 
been the work of their Creator, and not theirs. But the con- 
spicuous features of the absurdity do not stop here. 

4. We are told that the prohibition to eat the fruit was issued 
to Adam before Eve was released from her imprisonment in 
Adam's side, or from performing the functions of a rib-bone, 
before she became a woman and a wife ; and it is not even im- 
plied that it was intended to extend to her. Why, then, in the 
name of God, should such curses be heaped upon her devoted 
head for eating the fruit when she had not been forbidden to 
do so ? And it does not appear to have been wrong in any 
sense, only that Jehovah had issued an order forbidding it. 

5. Jehovah professed great sympathy for Adam's lonely con- 
dition, and made a help meet for him ; and yet the first meat 
she helped him to, it would seem, damned him and his posterity 
for ever. In view of this fact, it is probable Adam would have 
preferred to let her remain a bone in his side. 

6. Here let it be noted that Adam and Eve were ignorant and 
inexperienced beings. They had had no experience in any 
thing, and hence could not know that such an act, or any other 
act, was wrong and sinful. 

7. Nor could Adam know what the word " die " meant when 
Jehovah told him he would die the day he ate the fruit, as he 

• had seen nothing die. 



224 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

8. It may here be said in reply, that they should, in their 
ignorance, have obeyed the command which was given them. 
To this we reply, they did obey the command of one being. 
God told them not to eat, and the serpent told them to eat, the 
fruit ; and, not having lived with or had any experience with 
either of those omnipresent beings, how could they know what 
would be the consequence of obeying or disobeying either of 
them ? This question of itself is sufficient to settle the matter. 
They could not possibly know, with no experience in either 
case, that the consequence would be more serious or more fatal 
in disobejing Jehovah than the serpent. 

9. And as they got their eyes open by eating the fruit, and 
did not die as Jehovah told them they would (while the serpent 
told them they would not) , it is not to be wondered at that 
ever after the} 7 and their posterity should be more inclined to 
serve the serp'ent-devil than Jehovah, seeing that all the happy 
consequences which the former predicted as the result of eating 
the fruit were realized, while those of Jehovah were falsified. 
For proof see chap. 53. 

10. The most artful sophistry can not disguise the fact that 
the doctrine of moral depravity is a slanderous imputation upon 
divine mercy, goodness, and justice, and challenges not only 
his goodness, but his good sense. 

11. And every page of history and every principle of science 
demonstrate it to be both false and demoralizing. 

'Man fell up, and not down. 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

THE MORAL DEPRAVIT? OF MAN A DELUSION. 

It is alleged by the orthodox world that man's moral nature 
and reasoning faculties both became depraved by the fall. 
"Totally depraved" has been the doctrine; but the gradual 
expansion and enlightenment of the mind by progressive science 
have modified the doctrine with some of the churches, and they 
have substituted "moral depravity 99 for u total depravity." 



THE MORAL DEPRAVITY OF MAN A DELUSION. 225 

But neither assumption can be scientifically or logically sus- 
tained. The assumption that our reason is depraved is made 
the pretext for urging the superiority of revelation, and making 
reason subordinate to it, We are told, that, as our reason is 
depraved, we can not safely rely upon it to judge and criticise 
the Bible or the doctrine of the churches. Mr. Mood}^ recently 
exclaimed, in a religious controversy, "I never reason on re- 
ligion. None but the disciples of devils reason. It is danger- 
ous to reason on religion." Unconscious of his ignorance, Mr. 
Moody assumed a very ludicrous position. By the exercise of 
his reason on religion, Mr. Moody came to the conclusion that 
it is wrong to reason on religion, thus committing the very sin 
he condemns in others. He reasons on religion to convince 
people that it is wrong to reason on religion, and thus violates 
his own principles. His case is analogous to that of the town 
council which attempted to keep the prisoners of the county in 
the old jail while the} r erected a new jail with the timbers of the 
old one, — rather a difficult task to achieve, but not more so 
than Mr. Moody's attempt to keep his reason in chains while 
he is trying to exercise it. Or, rather, he insults his auditors by 
saying to them virtually, " I will use my reason on matters of 
religion, but you must not use yours." As a reasoning being 
he reasons with reasonable beings, and addresses their reason 
to convince them they ought not to reason on certain subjects. 
He uses logic to prove that logic is dangerous, and should not be 
used. By reasoning against reason he pulls both ways, like the 
Scotchman who attempted to lift himself by his ears. He com- 
mits logical suicide when he attempts to show there is any case 
in which reason should not be used. The truth is, a person 
can not think on the subject of religion without beginning to 
reason on it, because his reasoning faculties and his thinking 
faculties are both one. He thinks with •his intellect, and he 
reasons with his intellect ; and, the very moment he begins to 
think, he begins to reason. And therefore, if it is wrong to 
reason on religion, it is ivrong to have any religion. We should 
not allow it to occupy our thoughts for a single moment, and 
thus we would banish religion from the world ; which, however, 
would be no great loss if it is too absurd to bear the test of 



226 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

reason. And, if it is wrong to reason on religion, it is wrong 
to reason on any subject. The more important the subject, the 
more necessary to use reason upon it, that we may make no mis- 
takes in regard to it. The truth is, reason is the only faculty 
with which a man cafc comprehend religion, revelation, or the 
Bible. This would prove again that it is wrong to have any 
religion, if it is wrong to submit it to the judgment, and test it 
by our reasoning faculties. Reason is the principal faculty 
which distinguishes us from the brute ; and, therefore, to discard 
it is to Approximate to the condition of the brute. What a pity 
Mr. Moody had not been consulted in his creation that he might 
have had his reasoning faculties left out! then he would not be 
under the necessity of sinning daily by exercising his reason in 
his attempts to stop its exercise. And then there are other 
serious difficulties growing out of the reverend gentleman's 
position. His reason being "depraved," we can place no con- 
fidence in its exercise or decision in this case, so as to assume 
that his judgment and conclusions are correct when he declares 
against reason. If he reaches his conclusions through a de- 
praved reason, they can be of no account. The verdict can not 
transcend the judge or court which makes it. The reasoner 
being depraved, his reasoning and decision in the ease must be 
depraved also, and therefore worthless. Verily the gentleman 
is in a bad position, and rather a serious quandary; and every 
struggle to get out only sinks him deeper. He is in the predica- 
ment Of a dog running round after his tail. And then we 
should like to ask the gentleman, [f OUT reason is not to be 
depended upon in matters (A* religion, how is it to be depended 
upon in any ease/ And how does he know, or how can he 
know, but that, his reason being depraved, it has lead liim off 
the track, In this case, in his attempts to put it in chains? 
Will the reverend gentleman furnish a rule by which we can 
know in what ease OUT reason can be trusted, and in what eases 

we are to doff our moral manhood, and lie prostrate in the dust 

with the brute? And then the rule, being the product ^\' a de- 
praved reason, could not be relied upon. Really the reverend 
ntleman is In an inextricable quandary. The case famishes 
an illustrative proof <>t' the extent a man can make a fool of 



FREE AGENCY AND MORAL ACCOUNTABILITY. 227 

himself when he attempts to shipwreck his reason, and a proof 
that orthodoxy is a conglomeration of absurdities, and is entirely 
out of place in an age of progressive thought, and an age of 
reason and science. The only evidence we have ever had of 
the truth of the depravity of human reason is found in the fact 
that men professing to have common sense and reason can be- 
lieve it to be true. And the fact that our moral sense instinc- 
tively repels the doctrine of total depravity or moral depravity, 
and our reason rises up in rebellion against it, is proof positive 
of its absurdity. 

The thought is here suggested, that, if God could not get along 
without the adoption of an expedient calculated to corrupt our 
moral nature and deprave our reason, he should not and would 
not have implanted in us such an instinctive horror to the doc- 
trine. This natural feeling of repugnance is alone sufficient to 
condemn it, and prove that it is a slander upon Infinite Wisdom, 
and a libel upon human nature, to assume its existence. And 
such doctrine is evidently calculated to demoralize society. 
An old Roman proverb teaches us, " Call a man a dog, and he 
will be a dog." Call a child depraved, and it will feel depraved ; 
and, feeling so, it will act so. On the other hand, teach the child 
he possesses the grand principle and feeling of an inherent no- 
bility, and he will rise to the dignity of moral manhood. Such 
is the difference in the moral value of the two doctrines. 



CHAPTER XXXVII. 

FREE AGENCY AND MORAL ACCOUNTABILITY. 

One of the cardinal doctrines of the Christian faith is the 
free agency of man ; but the very term is a logical contradic- 
tion. An agent must act in accordance with the will and 
wishes of his employer, or he will be called to account, and 
perhaps dismissed. Where, then, is his moral freedom? It 
may be assumed that his employer licenses him to take his 
own course ; but this must be with certain conditions, or else 
he will act for himself, and be no agent at all. Certain. alterna- 



228 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

tives are placed before an agent, which he is privileged to choose ; 
but that does not make him free in any rational or practical 
sense. If he does not act as required or desired, he will be 
either punished or dismissed. That is a singular kind of free- 
dom. It is the freedom of a slave, which is no freedom at all ; 
and this is exactly the kind of freedom orthodoxy grants to 
the sinner, and to the whole human race. It marks out the 
road to heaven, and sa} T s, " This is the road to eternal bliss ; and 
you must walk in it, or eternal misery will be your portion.' ' 
And, to escape such a terrible doom, millions tremblingly travel 
the road impelled and propelled by fear. And this painful 
alternative Christians are pleased to term free agency, or moral 
freedom. It is simply the freedom of a slave to clank his chains. 
It is a perversion of language to apply the term " free agency " 
to such a case. The orthodox give us our choice to accept their 
terms of salvation or reject them ; but the} r attach to the conse- 
quence of rejecting them the most awful penalties. We will 
illustrate : A father says to his son some sabbath morning, 
"John, I am going to leave you free to-day either to go to 
church or go a-fishing." He instantly darts awa}^ to the river 
or the lake with the glee of a humming-bird, and is seen no 
more until nightfall. As he approaches the door, his father says 
to him, " John, where have you been to-day? " — " Why, father, 
I have been fishing, to be 811X6." — " Well now, John, I am 
going to give you one of the most terrible floggings } T ou ever 
had in your life for not going to church." — " Why, lather, you 
told me I might take my choice, and go either to church, or go 
a-fishing." — " That is true, John ; but it was with the implied 
understanding that, if you did not choose to go to church, I 
would give you an unmerciful whipping." This is free agency 
indeed! Jt is the free agency- of orthodoxy illustrated, and 
applied to practice. Free agenc} r coupled with a penalty is 
mora] slavery and moral tyranny. There is no moral freedom 
about it. You arc simply free to take your choice between two 
systems of slavery and two systems of punishment or suffering. 
A hare pursued by a hound enjoys a similar kind of freedom, — 
the freedom to stand and be caught, or the freedom to run. 
Of all the absurdities that ever entered the brain of a human 



FREE AGENCY AND MORAL ACCOUNTABILITY. 229 

being, that of setting God and the Devil both after man, as 
orthodoxy does, and then call him a free agent, is not excelled. 
We are told that we can not think a thought of ourselves. All 
our good thoughts and actions are prompted by a good being; 
and all our bad thoughts and actions by a bad being (God and 
the Devil) . Where, then, is our moral freedom or our moral 
accountability, if neither our thoughts nor our actions are our 
own, as they can not be if they are prompted by other beings? 
When a man performs a good act, it is assumed that God is the 
author of it ; and he is told that he must give God praise for 
it. On the other hand, all wicked actions are assigned to the 
Devil. He is thus a target between these two cross-fires. Such 
an assumption sweeps away the last vestige of free agency and 
moral accountability. Some Christian professors accept the 
doctrine of free agency to escape the dreaded alternative of as- 
suming man to be a mere machine, which the}^ call fatality. 
But here 3^011 have fatality to repletion. If to place man be- 
tween two all-powerful beings, and have them both trying to 
direct his actions at once, don't make him a machine, then we 
have no use for the word. It is strange that Christian pro- 
fessors have never discovered that, according to the teachings 
of the Bible, God himself is not a free agent. A free agent is 
one who can have things as he wills or wishes, so far as he has 
the power to make them so. Look, then, at the fact that, 
according to their own Bible, God himself does not enjoy this 
desirable boon. It is declared by that book that " God wills not 
the death (destruction) of the sinner, but that all shall be 
saved." And it is elsewhere declared that " strait is the gate, 
and narrow is the way, that leadeth unto life ; and few there be 
that find it." According to the first text, God desires to save 
all ; but, according to the second, he succeeds in saving but 
veiy few. Hence, not having things as he desires or wishes 
them to be, it is evident he is not a free agent, according to 
the orthodox or technical sense of that term. Why, then, talk 
of men being free agents, if a being with infinite power can not 
be a free agent ? 

To make man a free agent strictly or truly, he should have 
been consulted beforehand as to how, when, and where he 



230 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

would be born, or whether he would be born at all or not. 
Douglas Jerrold significantly remarks that, "if I had foreknown 
that a portion of mankind would be born to be damned, I'll be 

d cl if I would have been born at all." This expression, 

although profane, contains a good moral. Certainly nothing 
could be more preposterous or unreasonable than to hold one 
being accountable to another when the former had no agency in 
creating his mind or originating his inclinations, out of which 
all his actions grow. True accountability can only appertain 
to beings who created their own natural inclinations, or con- 
sented to receive those they are in possession of. This is clear 
and unanswerable logic. If man was made by God, or Infinite 
Wisdom, as Christians affirm, then common sense would teach 
that God alone is accountable for his actions. The man would 
be a fool who should blame a watch for not running right, 
knowing that the maker conferred upon it all the properties 
and powers it possessed. The maker of the watch alone is held 
responsible for all its perfections and imperfections. And, if 
man has a maker, it is a very clear case that that maker is 
equally responsible for his running wrong. There is no resist- 
ing this conclusion. The true assumption in the case is, that 
man has no creator in the orthodox sense, and is only responsi- 
ble to himself, and to society so far as he is a voluntary mem- 
ber of it. But orthodoxy makes his salvation depend not only 
upon his resisting the natural inclinations implanted in his 
system, but also upon the position of his birth. As an argu- 
ment in favor of sending the Bible to the heathen, they declare 
that millions perish every year because they have not the oppor- 
tunity of reading that "Holy Book," and learning the name 
of Jesus. This makes their salvation depend upon the locality 
of their birth: as some sections furnish the opportunity, and 
others do not. of becoming acquainted with their Bible, and the 
name of their Savior. 

We must imagine, therefore, in "the day of judgment" every 
human being will have a geographical question to answ< 
Alter being interrogated as to their conduct and practical li\ 

next question will be, " Where were you born?" If the 
answer IS, •* In Arabia." the reply of the judge will be, " Oh, 



THE DOCTRINE OF REPENTANCE ERRONEOUS. 231 

3^es ! you are a Mahoraedan. Our religion only saves those 
born in Christian countries. I must therefore set you aside 
among the goats." If the applicant is from India, he will be 
rejected from the kingdom, and consigned to perdition, because 
he is a "heathen." And thus Christianity is shown to be a 
geographical system of salvation, and makes a man's eternal 
destiny depend upon whether he is born in this country or that 
countiy, which strips it of all claim to either justice, impar- 
tiality, or good sense. The doctrine of free agency and moral 
accountability is one in a long list of theological absurdities, 
which originated in an age of scientific ignorance, when noth- 
ing was known of the natural powers, or the philosophy of the 
human mind, or the laws which control its action. 

Moral Accountability. — What is it? and where is it? It is 
certainly one of the greatest moral puzzles ever submitted to a 
philosopher, as to how a being, forced into existence by an 
omnipotent creative power, without his consultation or consent, 
can be responsible to that creative power for his conduct, when 
he had no agency and no volition in his own creation, and no 
power of resisting it, or in shaping its conditions. If God pos- 
sesses omnipotent power and infinite wisdom, and is a creator, 
he could and should have made man to act just as he wished 
him to act ; and, if he did not do so, common sense would sug- 
gest that it was his own fault. It will be seen from the force 
of this logic, that Christians must either give up the doctrine 
of a voluntary personal creator, or that of moral accountability. 
The two doctrines can not be made to harmonize together. 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

REPENTANCE -THE DOCTRINE ERRONEOUS. 

Having treated this subject somewhat lengthily and critically 
in " The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors/' we shall devote but 
a brief space to its elucidation here. Nearly all religious na- 
tions have attached great importance to the act of repentance ; 
but such an act does not repair the injury or wrong repented of. 



232 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

The repentance of a murderer does not restore his murdered 
victim to life ; nor does the repentance and tears of the incen- 
diary rebuild the dwelling he has destroyed by fire. What, 
then, is its practical value? 

We would ask, also, what moral value or merit can attach 
to an act of repentance when it is not claimed to be an act of 
the sinner, but " the power of God upon the soul " ? (Luther.) 
It appears then, according to orthodox logic, — 1. That God 
won't save the sinner unless he repents. 2. That he can't re- 
pent only as God moves him to do so. This places him in a 
bad predicament. Hence, when he does repent, it is an act of 
God. 3. And then God saves him because he makes him re- 
pent. Here is a jumble of logical incongruities and moral con- 
tradictions that can find no lodgment in a scientific mind. A 
few brief questions will set the doctrine of repentance in its true 
light. 

4. Repentance consists in merely a revival of early impres- 
sions, that may be either right or wrong, true or false, and 
almost as likely to be one as the other. 

5. Who ever knew a person to embrace more rational doc- 
trines, or become more intelligent, or have a stronger taste for 
scientific pursuits, b} r repentance? 

6. Is it not a fact that repentance usually causes a person to 
cling more tenaciously to the errors and superstitions in which 
he was educated ? 

7. Who ever knew a person by repenting, either in health or 
sickness, to condemn one wrong act which he had erroneously 
been taught to believe was right? If not, does it not prove 
that repentance always conforms to education, whether that 
education is light or wrong, and hence does nothing toward 
enlightening the convert or air^bocty else? 

8. On the contrary, when a man repents with his mind full 
of religious errors, is it not evident that the act of repentance 
will have the effect to rivet these errors more strongly upon his 
mind, and thus effect a moral injury instead of a moral benefit? 

'.). If a man may abandon some of his immoral habits, which 
he has been taught to believe are wrong, by an act of repent* 
a nee. are not the good effects to some extent counterbalanced 
by his clinging more strongly to his religious errors? 



THE DOCTRINE OF REPENTANCE ERRONEOUS. 233 

10. Who ever knew a person to abandon a false religion by 
repentance? Does a Hindoo or Mahomedan ever embrace 
Christianity by repenting ? 

11. Who ever knew a Roman Catholic to become a Protes- 
tant, or a Protestant a Catholic, by repentance ? And yet ortho- 
dox Christians will cite the belief and testimony of a dying 
man as an evidence of the truth of their doctrines. 

12. How can an act of repentance do any thing toward prov- 
ing what is right and what is wrong in any case, when one 
person repents for doing what another repents for not doing ? 
We have such cases recorded in history. 

We have known a Campbellite to leave his dying testimom^ in 
favor of water baptism, and a Quaker to leave his dying testi- 
mony against it. Does one case prove it to be wrong, and the 
other right? If not, why do Christians cite such cases? What 
do they prove ? 

For a further illustration of this subject, see " The World's 
Sixteen Crucified Saviors." 

Death-Bed Repentance. 

If there is an} r class of people who need to repent for mis- 
spent time, and for leading false and foolish lives, it is the 
colporteurs who travel over the country distributing pious tracts, 
containing doleful accounts of death-bed repentance, which, 
whether right or wrong, prove nothing. 

Such cases of repentance as are reported do not appertain to 
the moral conduct, but to the religious belief, of the sinner. It 
is the abandonment and condemnation of his past creeds, and 
not of his past conduct, which makes the tract so valuable. 
Such a case contains no moral instruction whatever. 

If his early education was Mahomedan, his repentance will 
establish that religion again in his mind ; but, if Mormonism 
was the religion of his childhood, he would again have full faith 
in that religion. What nonsense ! 

Who ever knew repentance to divorce or emancipate a man 
from all or any of the religious errors of his past life, and plant 
in his soul a better and more rational religion, or lead him to 
advocate any religion only that in which he had been educated ? 



234 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Such repentance is worth nothing, and absolutely foolish. Let 
us assume that the numerous cases of death-bed repentance 
published in religious tracts are all true ; and what would it 
prove? Why, simply this : that the converts had all been edu- 
cated to believe in Christianity, and had gone back to that 
religion. Had Budhism or Mahomedanism been their early 
religion, they would have returned to that. It is merely old 
errors and old truths revived and re-established in the mind. 

But many facts afterwards gathered by honest investigation, 
appertaining to some of these cases, show that they have either 
been manufactured or greatly exaggerated. As for example, 
the case of Thomas Paine is proved to be without foundation. 
His close was calm and peaceful. Many times has it been de- 
clared, in the pulpit and elsewhere, that " Tom Paine repented, 
and died a miserable death." And yet we have the testimony 
of those Christian professors who were present with him almost 
constantly during his last illness, that he never manifested the 
least compunction of conscience, or the least disposition to 
condemn an} r thing he had said or written in opposition to 
Christianity or the Bible. Take, for example, the testimony of 
Willet Hicks, a reliable Quaker preacher. On being interro- 
gated by a neighbor of the author of this work as to the truth 
of the statement that he repented, he replied, " I was with 
Paine every day during the latter part of his sickness, and can 
affirm that lie did not express any regret for having written 
c The Age of Reason,' as has been reported, nor for any thing 
he had said or written in opposition to the Bible, nor ask for- 
giveness of God. Be died as easy as any one 1 ever saw die ; 
and I have seen a great many die." And yet this Mr. Hickfl 
was in hopes lie would repent. Other similar testimony might 
be adduced : but this is sufficient. The story of Ethan Allen's 
daughter calling upon her lather during her last illness, and 
asking him if he would recommend her to die in his religious 

belief, and his feeling so eonseienee-smitten by the question, 
that he exclaimed. **\o: die in the belief of your mot her ! " 
(who was a Christian) has gone the rounds of the Christian 
pulpitS. And yet we have the statement of his nephew. Col. 
HitdlCOCk, that he had no daughter to die during his lifetime. 



THE DOCTRINE OF REPENTANCE ERRONEOUS. 235 

There is not one word of truth in the report. These two cases 
furnish samples of the manner in which a dying cause will grasp 
at straws. 

We will subjoin here the testimony of a clergyman, in proof 
that infidels are not more likely to die in a state of mental dis- 
tress than Christians : The Rev. Theodore Clap, in his autobi- 
ography, says, " In all my experience I never saw an unbeliever 
die in fear. I have seen them expire without any hope or ex- 
pectation of the future, but never in agitation from dread or 
misgiving as to what might befall them hereafter. We know 
that the idea is prevalent that this final event passes with some 
dreadful terror or agony of soul. It is imagined, that, in the 
infidel's case, the pangs of dissolution are greatly augmented 
by the upbraidings of a guilty conscience, and by the reluctance 
of the spirit to be torn from its mortal tenement, and hurried 
into the presence of an avenging Judge ; but this is all a su- 
perstitious fancy. It is a superstitious fear, from a false educa- 
tion, that causes any one to die in fear." 

The Rev. W. H. Spenser, of the First Parish Church (Massa- 
chusetts), says, " Some of the men most bitterly stigmatized as 
infidels have been among the most brilliant and useful minds the 
world has ever known, and, when dying and suffering from cal- 
umny and scorn, have only to wait for time to do them justice, 
and place them in history with the world's benefactors or sa- 
viors. There is not to be found on record one purely infidel 
man, in the sense now referred to, whose death-bed was at- 
tended b} T recantations and remorse." Thus testifies a clergy- 
man. 

We will now show from reliable authority that the most ardent 
faith in Christ and the Bible, and the most rigid and conscien- 
tious observance of their doctrines and precepts, do not guaran- 
tee permanent acquiescence or satisfaction, or protect the mind 
from the most violent mental perturbation in the hour of death. 
John Calvin stood in the first ranks of the Church militant in 
bis time, and was considered by many the leading clergyman 
in Christendom. Hear what Martin Luther, his co-laborer, says 
with respect to his mortal exit : " He died forlorn and forsaken 
of God, blaspheming to the very end. ... He died of scarlet- 



236 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

fever, overrun and eaten up by ulcerous abscesses, the stench of 
which drove every person away. He gave up the ghost, despair- 
ing of salvation, and evoking devils from the abyss, and uttering 
oaths most horrible, and blasphemies most frightful.' ' Then 
tell us no more about infidels recanting and dying unhappy, 
after reading this case. Yet all the cases and evidences cited 
above only tend to show that no forms of religious belief have 
an}' thing specially to do with the condition of mind in the 
hour of mortal dissolution, except so far as that belief has been 
invested with groundless, superstitious fears. Hence persons 
who distribute death-bed tracts are in rather small business. 
We like the answer of a liberal-minded man, who, when in his 
dying moments he was asked by a priest if he had made his 
peace with his God, replied, " We have-never had any unfriend- 
ly words." We don't believe there can be a case found in all 
Christendom of an infidel repenting whose parents were unbe- 
lievers, so that he was not educated and biased in favor of any 
form of religious faith or belief. 



CHAPTER XXXIX. 

FORGIVENESS FOR SIN, AN IMMORAL DOCTRINE. 

The doctrine of divine forgiveness for sin is another illogical 
and immoral doctrine of the orthodox school, as well as that 
of heathen nations, which a logical analysis and the practical 
experience of nearly all religious countries show has been per- 
nicious id its effects upon the morals of society. A little reflec- 
tion must convince any unbiased mind that, while men and 
women are taught to believe that the consequences of sin or 
crime c;iii l»e arrested or mitigated by an act of forgiveness by 
'the divine Law-maker, they will feel the less restrained from 
the commission of crime and wickedness. They naturally look 
upon it as a sort of license for the indulgence of their passions 
and propensities. They are taught that none of the evil conse- 
quences of wrong-doing can follow them to another world if 
they repent in time, and ask forgiveness. This they accept as a 



FORGIVENESS FOB SIN, AN IMMORAL DOCTRINE. 237 

broad license to take their swing in vice and villainy. And thus 
they are partially demoralized by the doctrine. Much more ra- 
tional is the doctrine of the Swedenborgians and Harmonialists, 
that every sin or wrong act we commit makes its impress upon 
the soul, or immortal spirit, which will be carried with it to the 
life eternal, and will there long operate to impair the happiness, 
and retard the spiritual growth, of every person who in this life 
indulges in crime or immoral conduct. They teach us that the 
character we form for ourselves on this plane of existence will 
be carried with us to the spirit- world ; that our character under- 
goes no radical change by merely passing through the gates of 
death. Hence, whatever defective moral qualities we permit to 
be incorporated into our characters here will operate to sink us 
to a lower plane of happiness in the after-death world. This is a 
plausible and rational doctrine, to say the least, and can have no 
effect to demoralize the community, as the sentiments breathed 
forth by some of the orthodox hymns have evidently done. 

" There is a fountain filled with blood, 
Drawn from Inimanuel' s veins ; 
And sinners plunged beneath that flood 
Lose all their guilty stains." 

Could any doctrine be more demoralizing than that here set 
forth, — that the deep-dyed stains of a life of crime, debauch- 
ery, and wickedness can all be wiped out b}^ the simple act of 
plunging into a pool of blood, or rather by believing that the 
atoning blood of Christ will cleanse from all sin ? The same 
idea is incorporated into Watts' s well-known hymn, — 

" While the lamp holds out to burn, 
The vilest sinner may return." 

The idea here set forth is shocking to the moralist, as well as 
demoralizing in its effects on the community. u The vilest sin- 
ner ' ' must feel very little concern about ' ' returning ' ' to the path 
of virtue, or abandoning his wicked deeds, while the conviction 
is established in his mind that he is losing nothing by leading 
such a life, and will have nothing to do at the end of a long life 
of the most shocking crimes, villainies, and vices, to escape 
entirely their legitimate punitive consequences, but to take a dip 



233 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

in " the blood of Jesus." Every scientific moralist can see 
very plainly that the world can never be reformed while such 
license for sin and wickedness is issued from the Christian 
pulpit. Practically speaking, God could not forgive a sin. An 
act of forgiveness implies that the legitimate consequence of 
the evil deed or sinful act can be set aside, and escaped. The 
principles of moral science teach us that this is impossible. It 
demonstrates that the moral law is a part of our being ; and, 
consequently, an act of forgiveness for the violation of that 
law could not suspend its operation, or stop the infliction of its 
penalty upon the perpetrator. It could then, of course, effect 
nothing. Hence it will be seen that no sin can be forgiven, but 
must work out its legitimate consequences. Scientifically speak- 
ing, the law is the cause, and the penalty the effect : when the 
cause is set in operation, the effect must follow. It would be as 
easy to arrest the thunderbolt in its descent from the clouds as 
to evade the penalty of this law. God could not if he would, 
and would not if he could, forgive the violation of his laws. He 
could not, because he has wisely arranged those laws to operate 
without his interference. On the other hand, he would not if he 
could, because it would encourage their future and further viola- 
tion. And then a God who would confer on us an inclination to 
commit certain acts, and then require us to ask his forgiveness 
for committing them, would not be a very consistent being. For- 
giveness is, theologically speaking, u a free ticket to Heaven." 
Bu} T a through ticket of the priest, and you can go on "the 
strait-line" road, direct to the orthodox "house of many 
mansions/' without having to switch off at any station to un- 
ioad your burden of sins. " All is well that ends well " is their 
motto. The orthodox clergy tell the most vile and debauched 
villain and Moody assassin, after he has inhumanly butchered 
and murdered his innocent and virtuous wife, can, by an act 
of repentance and forgiveness, swing from the end of the 

hangman's rope directly into a heaven of pure and unalloyed 
Miss, and, with his fingers all dripping with human blood, join 
the white-robed saints in shouting, " Glory hallelujah to the 
Lord God and the Lamb for ever and ever!" Spare me, oh, 
spare me, from ever believing in such a demoralizing religion as 
this! 



CAN QOD BE SUBJECT TO ANGER t 239 



CHAPTER XL. 

CAN GOD BE SUBJECT TO ANGER? 

All Bibles, and nearly every religious nation known to historjr, 
have taught that God often gets angry at the creatures of his 
own creation. But, in the light of modern science, nothing 
could be more transcendent^ absurd, or more absolutely impos- 
sible, than that a being possessing all knowledge — a being 
infinite in power, infinite in wisdom, and filling all space through- 
out the boundless universe — should be a victim to the weakness 
and ungovernable impulse of passion. The very idea is revolt- 
ing and blasphemous, and presents to every reflecting and un- 
biased mind a self-evident impossibility. The emotion of anger 
can onty be the weakness of finite and imperfect beings. It is 
self-evidently impossible for a being possessing infinite perfec- 
tion, and consequently infinite self-government, to cherish the 
feeling of anger for a moment, as the following consideration 
will show : — 

1 . The modern study of mental philosophy has demonstrated 
anger to be a species of moral weakness ; and hence it could 
not, for a single moment, occupy a mind possessing infinite 
perfection. A being, therefore, who is assumed to possess such 
a weakness is self-evidently not a God, but merely an imagi- 
naiy being, fit only to be worshiped by ignorant slaves. 

2. The practical experience of every person demonstrates 
anger to be a species of unhappiness, and often of absolute 
miser}' ; and the indulgence of this passion not only makes 
the possessor unhappy, but destroys the happiness of every one 
around him. If, therefore, God were an angry being, instead 
of heaven being a place or state of happiness, it would be the 
most miserable place imaginable ; for God is represented by 
the Christian Bible as getting angry every day (see Ps. vii. 11) , 



240 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

and so angry that the "fury conies up in his face." As a 
Yankee would say, " He gets mad all over." I frankly confess 
I don't want to live in such a heaven, or with such a God. 
Indeed, it would be no heaven at all for anybody ; for heaven 
is a state of happiness. 

3. In the third place, the modern study of the science of phi- 
losophy has discovered that anger is a species of disease, which 
may result in mental and even physical suicide if carried far 
enough. It produces a congested state of the blood-vessels of 
the brain, which, if not arrested in its progress, will produce 
death. Dr. Gunn, in his work on domestic medicine, reports 
several cases in which an inquest was held over a dead body b}- a 
coroner's jury, and the verdict rendered, " Came to his death in 
a fit of anger." However irreverent, the thought forces itself 
upon us, that such a verdict might be given over the dead body 
of Jehovah if we w^ere compelled to believe all we read of his 
getting angry ; for it is a scientific deduction that can not be 
resisted, that, if anger can produce death in one being, it may 
in all beings subject to its influence. 

4. Again : as the result of the study of mental philosophy, 
anger is now known to be a species of insanit} T . It deranges, 
more or less, all the faculties of the mind, and often disqualifies 
the possessor for doing any thing right, or acting rationally, 
while under its influence. It often causes him to act without 
reason or judgment, and is liable to drive him to the commis- 
sion of crime. As well think of entering the cage of a tiger as 
to take up our abode in a heaven ruled hy such a God, — a 
heaven controlled by a God bereft of reason by the ungoverna- 
ble action of his own passions. We could not be happy in 
Midi a heaven: we should be constantly under (lie influence 
of fear and apprehension, lest he should become enraged, and 
his vengeance fall upon us. Where there is fear there is no 
heaven or happiness. If, as the Bible tells us, he is Liable to 
repent, he might experience this mental perturbation at any 

time, and repent for haying admitted us into the heavenly 

kingdom) and consequently expel us. Under such circum- 
stances our motives would he very much weakened for laboring 
to reach such a heaven, not knowing that we should be per- 



CAN GOB BE SUBJECT TO ANGER? 241 

mitted to remain there a single hour. How supremely ridicu- 
lous, when logically analyzed, is the conception of an angry 
God ! It is entirely behind the age, and adapted only to the 
lowest stages of barbarism ; and yet thousands of Christian 
clergymen preach this demoralizing doctrine from the pulpit 
every sabbath day. It is demoralizing, because no person can 
believe in an angry, sin-punishing God, without cherishing such 
feelings in his own bosom. It is impossible for him to avoid it. 
Indeed, he has no motives for trying to avoid it ; but, on the 
contrary, he possesses the strongest motives for cultivating such 
feelings. For Archbishop Whately says, "Religious people 
always try to be like the God the}' worship." They consider 
it not only their privilege, but their duty, to imitate him. 
Hence, if they believe he gets mad occasionally, and pours out 
his vengeance upon his offending children (his disobedient sub- 
jects), the}' will naturally feel like following his example, and 
be cruel and revengeful to those who excite their anger. This 
preaching the doctrine of an angry God has a tendency to 
foster vengeful and vindictive feelings amongst the people ; 
when, if the clergy would preach only a God of infinite love, 
infinite goodness, infinite perfection in all his attributes, we 
should soon see a marked change in society. Kindness, love, 
and good- will would be manifested between man and man ; and 
cruel, vengeful, and vindictive feelings would gradually die out, 
and be numbered amongst the things which have been and are 
not. Then would the kingdom of peace be established on 
earth, and the millennium be ushered in. But we can not expect 
the priests to be better than their God, nor the people to be 
better than their priests. "Like God like priest, and like 
priest like people." The priest deals out damnation upon 
the people to be like his God ; and the people follow in his foot- 
steps, and exercise cruel and revengeful feelings toward each 
other. It seems astonishing that such an immoral and blas- 
phemous doctrine should have been so long and so extensively 
tolerated in professedly enlightened countries, as it is evident it 
must have had a bad effect ; and past experience proves it has 
had a demoralizing effect upon the people where the doctrine 
has been preached. It furnishes an illustration of the omnipo- 
tent power of custom. 



242 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 



CHAPTER XLI. 

ATONEMENT FOR SIN, AN IMMORAL DOCTRINE. 

Having appropriated a portion of two chapters in " The 
World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors " to an exposition of the 
doctrine of the atonement, we shall treat the subject but briefly 
in this work. 

1. It is shown in the work above mentioned, that the doctrine 
of the atonement is of heathen origin, and that it is predicated 
upon the assumption that no sin can be fully expiated without 
the shedding of blood. In the language of Paul, " Without the 
shedding of blood, there can be no remission for sin." A bar- 
barous and bloody doctrine truly ! But this doctrine was almost 
universally prevalent amongst the Orientals long before Paul's 
time. 

2. Christians predicate the dogma of atonement for sin upon 
the assumption that Christ's death and sufferings were a substi- 
tute for Adam's death, incurred by the fall. But as Adam's 
sentence was death, and he suffered that penalty, this assump- 
tion can not be true. 

3. If the penalty for sin was death, as taught in Gen. iii., and 
Christ suffered that penalty for man, then man should not die ; 
but, as he does, it makes the doctrine preposterous. It could 
not have meant spiritual death, as some argue, because a part 
of the penalty was that of being doomed to return to dust (Gen. 
iii. 19). 

4. If crucifixion was indispensably necessary as a penalty, 
then the punishment should have been inflicted cither upon the 
Instigator or perpetrator of the deed: either the serpent or 
Adam should have been nailed to the cross. 

5. We arc told iii reply, that, as an infinite sin was committed, 
it required an infinite sacrifice. But Adam, being a finite being, 



ATONEMENT, AN IMMORAL DOCTRINE. 243 

could not commit an infinite sin ; and Christ's sacrifice and 
sufferings could not be infinite, unless he had continued to suffer 
to all eternity. Therefore the assumption is false. 

6. An all- wise God would not let things get into such a con- 
dition as to require the murder of his only son from any consid- 
eration whatever. 

7. And no father, cherishing a proper regard and love for his 
son, could have required him to be, or consented to have him, 
put to death in a cruel manner ; for the claims of mercy and 
paternal affection are as imperative as justice. 

8. To put an intelligent and innocent being to death for any 
purpose is a violation of the moral law, and as great a sin as 
that for which he died. Hecatombs of victims can not atone for 
the infraction of the moral law which is engraven upon our 
souls. 

9. If it were necessary for Christ to be put to death, then 
Judas is entitled to one-half the merit of it for inaugurating the 
act, as it could not have taken place without his aid ; and no 
one who took part in it should be censured, but praised. 

10. It is evident, that, if everybody had been Quakers, no 
atonement would have been made, as their religion is opposed to 
bloodshed. 

11. The atonement is either one Gocl putting another to 
death, or God putting himself to death to appease his own 
wrath ; but both assumptions are monstrous absurdities, which 
no person distinguished for science or reason can indorse. 

12. Anger and murder are the two principal features in the 
doctrine of the atonement ; and both are repugnant to our 
moral sense and feelings of refinement, and indicate a barbar- 
ous and heathen origin. 

13. The atonement punishes the innocent for the guilty; 
which is a double or twofold crime, and a reversal of the spirit 
of justice. If a father should catch four of his children steal- 
ing, and the fifth one standing by and remonstrating against the 
act, and should seize on the innocent one and administer a 
severe flagellation, he would commit a double crime : 1st, that 

i of punishing an innocent child ; 2d, that of exonerating and 
encouraging the four guilty children in the commission of crime. 
The atonement involves the same principle. 



244 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

14. No person with true moral manhood would consent to be 
saved on any such terms ; but would prefer to suffer for his own 
sins, rather than let an innocent being suffer for them. And the 
man who would accept salvation upon such terms must be a 
sneak and a coward, with a soul not worth saving. 

15. Who that possesses any sense of justice would want to 
swim through blood to get to the heavenly mansion ? I want 
neither animals, men, nor Gods murdered to save nry soul. 

1G. If there is any virtue in the atonement in the way 
of expiating crime, then there is now another atonement de- 
manded by the principles of moral justice to cancel the sin 
committed \>y the first atonement, — that of murdering an inno- 
cent being, " in whose mouth was no guile ; " and then another 
atonement to wipe out the sin of this atonement, and so on. 
And thus it would be atonement after atonement, murder after 
murder, ad infinitum. What shocking consequences and ab- 
surdities are involved in this ancient heathen superstition ! 

17. It seems strange that an} r person can cherish the thought 
for a moment that the Infinite Father would require a sacrificial 
offering for the trifling act of eating a little fruit, and require 
no atonement for the infinitely greater sin of murdering " his 
only-begotten son." Another monstrous absurdity ! 

18. The advocates of the atonement tell us that man stands 
toward his Creator in the relation of a debtor ; and the atone- 
ment cancels the debt. To be sure ! How does it do it ? We 
will illustrate : A man says to his neighbor, " I owe you a thou- 
sand dollars; but I won't pay it." — " Very well," saj's the 
creditor, " I will tell } t ou what I will do : I will forgive the debt 
by seizing on my own son, strip him of all he has, and then put 
him to death. The claims of justice will then be satisfied." A 
monstrous idea of justice ! 

11). The Jewish n nd Chaldean law of atonement required the 
offender to place his hand on the head of the beast while being 
consumed in sacrifice; and this was accepted as an atonement 

lor his transgressions. Such a conception is both senseless and 

demoralizing. He was thereby taught that he would escape the 
legitimate consequences of his crime. And the Christian atone- 
ment is no better. The sin-atoning offering of Christ furnishes 



ATONEMENT, AN IMMORAL DOCTRINE. 245 

an open door through which the sinner escapes the just punish- 
ment of law. It is at least a partial liquidation of his sins. 
When one being is punished for another, this is, to the latter, 
an immunity from punishment ; and the ends of justice are thus 
completely thwarted, and the moral law broken and trampled 
under foot. If a culprit were sentenced to the penalty of death 
for murder, and the punishment of another man were accepted 
in his stead, every court in the civilized world would decide that 
two wrongs were committed, — the punishment of the innocent, 
and the pardon of the guilty. Such doctrines are repugnant to 
all ideas of justice, and are most certainly demoralizing. 

20. The wrong-doer should be taught that he is just as guilty, 
and just as certain of punishment for his crime, as if all the 
Gods in heaven were put to death to atone for his sin ; the 
penahy being inseparable from the act. 

21. What would be thought of the government that should 
punish the law-maker instead of the law-breaker? This is 
exactly what the atonement amounts to ; so that the law-maker 
falls a victim to the penalty of his own laws. It is God the 
law-maker dying for man the law-breaker. Such ideas and 
such doctrines are monstrous, and completely overthrow every 
principle of civil jurisprudence. 

22. A God who could resort to such desperate expedients to 
appease his anger, and satisfy the demands of justice, is not a 
God, but merely an imaginary being which was conjured up in 
an age of ignorance and superstition. The belief in such a 
God is, nevertheless, demoralizing. 

We will here relate an anecdote, showing that such ideas of 
the Supreme Being are repulsive even to the unenlightened 
heathen: In Smith's " Gulf of Guinea" it is stated, that, as 
a Christian missionary was presenting the doctrine of the Chris- 
tian religion to Pepples, King of Bonn} 7 , and told him that God 
gave his only-begotten son to die for us, — to be put to death 
for our sins, — the king stopped him by saying, u Do you think 
me a fool to believe such palaver as that, — that God would kill 
his own son to please himself; get mad at man, and then kill 
his own son, instead of killing him? Never! never can I be- 
lieve such fool palaver as that. It is big fool lie." "I tried," 



246 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

says the missionary, "'to impress upon his mind that nothing 
would satisfy divine justice but such a sacrifice ; but he cut me 
short by exclaiming, ' That will do ; that will do : I have got 
enough of such fool palaver."" Quite a sensible "heathen" 
was King Pepples. 



CHAPTER XLII. 

SPECIAL PROVIDENCE, AN ERRONEOUS DOCTRINE. 

All the holy books, and nearly all holy men who have figured 
in the world, have cherished a belief in what is termed "special 
providences," — a doctrine which teaches that God individually 
and personally superintends the affairs, not only of all nations, 
but of each individual human being, now amounting in number 
to about fourteen hundred millions. It seems strange that the 
striking absurdity of such an assumption has not struck every 
mind possessing the power to reflect or investigate. The 
thought of his looking after the affairs and happiness of fourteen 
hundred millions of human beings at a time, besides running 
several thousand millions of worlds, far excels any of the 
astounding feats of the evil genii of Gulliver. In the sublimity 
of its absurdity and impossibility, it stands without a rival. 
It expands beyond the utmost stretch of human credulity. 
Like all the other doctrines of the popular creed, it sprang up 
in an age of the world when the human mind accepted ev< 
thing presented to it without investigation, — when nothing was 
rejected on the ground of its being too absurd to be believed. 
And :m absurdity, when once established, no matter how nion- 

OUS or how stultifying to the intellectual or reasoning facul- 
ties, can bid defiance to the efforts of the few men of the world 

whose minds are too much expanded and enlightened to accept 
BUCh grOSS absurdities. There are several objections to the 
doctrine of ".special providences." both of a logical or scien- 
tific character, and al80 upon moral grounds, which shows that 
it should have no place in an age of scientific intelligence. 

One of these objections is the one just brought to notice, — 



SPECIAL PROVIDENCE. 247 

that of its extreme absurdity and practical impossibilty. It 
does not require a great mind, but only a reflecting one, to see 
that no rational conception of the Supreme Being could render 
it practicable for one mind, however boundless in knowledge 
and infinite in power, to be so divided as to look after the 
interest of each individual of a countless number, scattered 
over a world of more than a hundred and seventy-five thou- 
sand millions of miles in extent. A scientific investigation 
of the operations of nature has settled the conviction in every 
scientific mind that the life, actions, and destiny of every 
human being are under the control of fixed and immutable 
laws, which need only to be studied and observed to guard him 
effectually from personal accidents, and those physical disasters 
to which he often falls a victim through ignorance of the proper 
means of avoiding them. It is now patent to all critical ob- 
servers that the serious disasters and numerous causes of phys- 
ical suffering to which the larger portion of the human family 
were so frequently subjected in past ages, have largely dimin- 
ished, and are constantly decreasing as the march of science 
dispels the ignorance of the people, — such as the sinking of 
ships, attributable to imperfect mechanical construction ; pesti- 
lential diseases, caused by the general ignorance of the causes 
of and means of preventing ; the explosion of steam-boilers on 
rivers, railroads, &c. And, from the present rates of improve- 
ment in these respects, we may reasonably calculate that the 
time is not far in the future when such disasters will be un- 
known. Then we will have no need of ;i special providence" to 
save the people from the fatal consequences of their ignorance. 
The conviction seems now to be generally established in the 
public mind, tliat when a boat is wrecked, or a locomotive 
strays from the track, and a few persons escape with their lives 
from the general wreck and ruin, it is to be ascribed to the 
interposition of the hand of Providence. But common sense 
would suggest, that, if Providence had any thing to do with it, 
he should have commenced a little sooner, and put some more 
brains or common sense into the heads of the managers of these 
cargoes of human -beings, or kept the whiskey out of their 
stomachs till they reached their point of destination. In the 



248 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

thousands of cases annually reported of Providence interposing 
his aid to save some reckless mariners, or some heedless pas- 
sengers on a pleasure-boat, from a watery grave, or rescuing a 
few persons from the wreck of a railroad bridge, or some similar 
calamity, the disasters might all have been avoided by Provi- 
dence simply acting upon the wisdom of the proverb, " An 
ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." It would be 
considered an act of criminal neglect on the part of a father 
who could stand by and see his children, from ignorance of the 
clanger of such a situation, fall from a precipice, and get crip- 
pled : for which his diligence in taking care of them, and trying 
to heal their bruises, would by no means excuse him, as he 
should have commenced sooner, and prevented the accident 
from taking place. And nearly all the cases of providential 
interposition are liable to the same objection : the assistance is 
too long delayed. A collision of two ships recentry occurred 
on the Atlantic, by which both vessels were reduced almost to 
wrecks ; but ' ' providentially but few lives were lost," though most 
of the passengers were injured. Now the question naturally 
arises, Why did not God, when he perceived the vessels were 
approaching each other, interpose his providential care, and 
prevent the disaster? He either could not, or would not ; and, 
in either case, he is not infinite in all his attributes, according 
to the general ideas of the matter. If he could not, he is either 
not omnipresent or not infinite in power; and, if he could and 
would not, he is not infinite in kindness and benevolence, or he 
would have put forth his hand, and saved his children from such 
a terrible fate. It is time mankind would learn that God 
governs the universe by general laws, fixed and unalterable, 
and ever harmonious, and that he never interferes immediately 
or personally in the affairs of men. 

That finite human spirits do, in many cases, aid in human 
affairs by warning of danger. &c., is fully believed by many 
persons. If this be true, their interposition would be liable to 
be mistaken for that of the Infinite Spirit. But that any being 
can perform millions of finite nets a1 once, or that God should 

suspend the operation of his laws, which control the universe, for 
the purpose of attending personally to the wants and prayers of 



SPECIAL PROVIDENCE. 249 

each and every individual the world over, — many of the petitions 
running counter to, or in direct conflict with, each other, — 
is an idea too absurd to find lodgment in any truly enlightened 
mind. But we entertain the pleasing thought that men are 
beginning to learn that God governs by general laws, and not 
by personal or special agency. These laws are so perfect in 
their operations that no special laws or personal interference is 
necessary in any case. A critical investigation of any case of 
special providences would satisfy any scientific investigator that 
it was governed entirety by natural causes ; but such scrutiniz- 
ing investigations are seldom made. 

The great mass of pious people in all past ages have been so 
ignorant, and so little accustomed to reasoning or observation, 
that they have never observed, that, although many cases are 
reported of Providence interfering to save the life of a child 
who fell from the window of a basement-story, none are re- 
corded of his saving a child that fell from the fifth story. Why 
is this ? Does not this fact suggest a scientific lesson ? But 
the heads of the great mass of the people have been so filled 
with creeds and catechisms that they have no room for science. 
It will be time enough to talk about special providences after a 
case is known of a man escaping with his life after a cannon- 
ball has passed through his head, or a bullet through his heart. 
The belief in special providences is calculated to paralyze hu- 
man effort in times of danger, and thus suffer the consequences 
to be more frequently fatal. Let a man believe, while a ship 
is being wrecked in a storm, dashing against rocks and billows, 
and her deck overflowed with water, that there is a Providence 
in the case, and he will naturally labor with less zeal and effort 
to save the vessel. If the case is in the hands of God, and it 
is his good pleasure that they should be lost, it is of but little 
use to work the pumps ; and, if it is his will that they should be 
saved, they will be saved without much effort on their part. 
There can be no doubt but that millions of pious people have 
been restrained on various occasions from putting forth their 
strongest efforts to arrest a threatening disaster, from the con- 
viction that the hand of God was in it, and that no human 
efforts could change the fate he had decreed for them. And 



250 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

thus the doctrine, in its practical consequences, has been per- 
nicious. But, in this age of reason and scientific illumination, 
men are beginning to learn, that, in cases of threatening dan- 
ger and destruction, muscle is more necessary than "Provi- 
dence ; " that, when a ship is sinking in mid-ocean, pumps are 
more efficacious than praj^ers ; and, when a building is on fire, 
they can better do without the assistance of Providence than 
without water, firemen, and engines. 



CHAPTER XLIII. 

FAITH AND BELIEF, BIBLE EKROKS RESPECTING. 

" Faith " and "belief" seem to be among the most important 
words in the Christian New Testament. No words are much 
more frequently used.. They occur in nearly every chapter, and 
are used more than two hundred times. The following is a 
specimen of the manner in which these words are used : — 

" Pie that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he 
that believeth not shall be damned." This text, and the senti- 
ment it contains, have caused more misery, cruelty, and more 
butchery than all the edicts of an}' king that ever sat on the 
throne of England. Never did a more delusive and fatal error 
find lodgment In the human mind than the idea couched in this 
text. Terrible have been the denunciations, punishments, and 
cruelties poured upon the unbelievers in the popular creed, 
though that creed lias been one thing one day, and something 
else the next. No matter how honest, how upright, how benev 
olent, or how righteous a man proved himself in his practical 
life, he was doomed to the dungeon, the fagot, and the halter, 
if his creed was not conformable to the orthodox faith then in 
power. Men and women have been condemned and punished 
for assuming the right to doubt the truth of any doctrine of the 
popular creeds — an egregious mistake, showing a profound igno- 
rance of the nature of the human mind. All persons versed in 

the science of mental philosophy now know that a man has no 
more control over his doubts and beliefs than he has over the 



BIBLE EBBOBS BESPECTING FAITH AND BELIEF. 251 

blood that courses through his veins : for, without evidence, he 
can not believe ; and, with it, he can not disbelieve, as every 
one will find who will examine this matter critically. Conse- 
quently it is as unreasonable to condemn a man for his belief 
or disbelief, as to condemn him for the color of his hair. 
Doubt, so far from being restrained, should be cultivated, as 
being the first step toward the attainment of knowledge and 
progress ; for a man never makes any advancement or im- 
provement in his views on any subject till he begins to doubt 
the correctness of his present views, or, at least, doubts their 
being perfect, or being incapable of improvement. 

Who, then, can not see that to threaten a man for disbelief 
is tyranny and injustice, inasmuch as it has a tendency to make 
him a slave, and to repress the growth of his mind? Con- 
demning a man for disbelief is virtually offering a premium 
for hypocrisy, as it has the effect to make thousands profess to 
believe doctrines which they do not, and which their consciences 
really condemn, in order to avoid the frowns and ill-will of their 
neighbors. And, as hypocrisy is a greater evil in its practical 
effects upon society than unbelief, it can be seen that the prac- 
tice of erecting a standard for belief and disbelief is wrong, 
and mischievous in its effects. 

The Bible declares that " faith is the gift of God." It is 
evident, that, if this be true, no responsibility can attach to faith 
or religious belief ; but all responsibility rests with the being 
who gives it. 

Two great blunders have been committed by faith-dealers : 
First, in assuming that belief is of the nature of a coat, which 
can be put on and off at pleasure, — i.e., that a man can believe 
what he pleases or wishes to believe. The second is, that 
knowledge and belief are synonymous terms, which is very far 
from being true. Knowledge begins where faith and belief end. 
Belief is that uncertain state of the mind which is experienced 
in the absence of knowledge ; and, when that knowledge is 
obtained, the belief may prove to have been entirely erroneous. 
Belief implies uncertainty ; knowledge implies certainty. There 
is this wide difference between them. We believe a thing when 
we do not know whether it is so or not ; consequently the 



252 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

belief may be true or false. How egregious, then, the blunder 
of the orthodox world in condemning for disbelief! Belief, 
then, is a state of guessing. We will illustrate the position 
of orthodox Christendom : A bo}^ throws up a copper coin, and 
cries, " Heads, or tails?" A by-stander, believing from its 
construction that " heads " will come up, cries out, " Heads ! " 
Now, according to the logic of the orthodox, if he guesses 
wrong, he should be damned eternally for it. 

When you say to a man, " You shall believe this, or you 
shall believe that," you bind his soul in chains, and reverse 
the wheels of his progress, and push him toward the u dark 
ages." 

The fear that it would be a sin to doubt, causes religious 
ignorance ; and a man will never abandon his religious errors 
and superstitions while he fears to doubt their truth. A man's 
belief and creed grow shorter as his knowledge increases. 
And the time is not far distant when philosophers and men of 
science will have no religious belief: all will be knowledge. 

It can be seen from the above exposition, that it is foil}* and 
consummate ignorance to attach so much importance to re- 
ligious belief, inasmuch as it is impossible to know whether it 
is right or wrong. 

As the doctrine that belief is a virtue, and unbelief a crime 
has inundated the world with persecution, misery, and blood, 
it is time to abandon it. 

Those Christians who assume that belief is under the control 
of the will can settle the matter by trying the following experi- 
ment ni)on themselves: Let them try to believe, for only live 
minutes, that Mahomet was a true prophet, and Jesus Christ 
was an Impostor. If the} 7 can do this, it will settle the ques- 
tion, and prove that man is responsible for his belief: other- 
wise he is not. 

Some persona adhere to the Bible upon the plea that "it te 
safest to believe it, and unsafe to disbelieve it." But he who 
can believe an error or absurdity, or, rather, profess to beli 
it because he is afraid to disbelieve it. has not a soul big 
enough to be Baved, and will be certain to miss it; or. if lie 
could he saved, no man of sense would want to live in a heaven 



A PERSONAL GOD IMPOSSIBLE. 253 

made up of such moral cowards and moral dwarfs. And, be- 
sides, the only way to make a safe thing of being saved on this 
ground, is to swallow all the two thousand systems of religion 
in the world, — six hundred Christian creeds, and fourteen 
hundred heathen traditions ; and, to do this, a person must have 
a veiy capacious stomach. 



CHAPTER XLIV. 

A PEESONAL GOD IMPOSSIBLE. 

Most of the Bibles, and nearly all the religious teachers of 
the world, have represented God as being a personal being, and, 
at the same time, an infinite spirit. But that is another of the 
u thousand and one" absurdities that have been taught and 
believed in the name of religion. A personal being must, in 
all cases, be an organized being. This is so self-evident as to 
need no argument ; and that an organized being can not be 
an infinite being is almost equally self-evident. An organized 
being must be a finite being. The word " finite " is used to ex- 
press the opposite of "infinite." To assume, therefore, that a 
finite being, or a being with a finite body, can also be infinite, 
is equivalent to assuming that a thing can be white and black, 
large and small, long and short, light and heavy, &c, at the 
same time ; which is a self-evident absurdity. A personal being 
must be constituted of different parts, or members, — as a head, 
heart, boclv, feet, &c. ; and, if such a being could be infinite, 
then each member must be infinite. But as it is self-evident that 
a being to be infinite must fill all space, and that nothing can 
be infinite unless it does occupy all space, it can be seen at 
once, that, if one member were infinite, it would occup}' all 
space, which would preclude the possibility of another member 
being infinite. Thus we are completely swamped at the first 
step toward making a personal God infinite. Here let it be 
noted that the God of the Bible is represented as possessing 
all the members of the human body, — eyes (1 Pet, iii. 12), 



254 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

ears (Ibid.), nose (Isa. 65, 5), mouth (Isa. xlv. 23), feet 
(Rev. i. 15), arms (Isa. xxx. 30), hands (Exod. xiii. 3), fingers 
(Exod. viii. 19), head (Dan. vii. 9), heart (Isa. lxiii. 4), 
lips (Ps. xvii. 4), &c. Now, it is evidently impossible that 
such a being could be infinite. We may be told that these 
members are all to be taken in a spiritual sense. Granted, and 
the thing is equally impossible ; for they must still be separate 
members. There could be no possible sense in applying all 
these terms to the whole being. They must apply to separate 
parts ; and, the moment we use terms which imply the existence 
of more than one part, we concede the impossibirhy of such a 
God being infinite : for only one part, one being, or one thing 
can be infinite. There can not be two infinite beings, — self- 
e violently not. 

And there are other logical difficulties in the way of admitting 
the existence of an infinite personal God. If there could be 
such a thing as an infinite personality or organized being, it is 
evident that only one such being could exist. What, then, 
becomes of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and also the 
Devil ? They are all spoken of in the Bible as being omnipres- 
ent. Hence they must all be infinite, which is another self- 
evident impossibiWy. We could as easily conceive of two 
heads wearing the same hat at the same time, as two such 
beings being infinite. If one of them is infinite, the others can 
not be; and 3^et each is represented as being omnipresent, 
which would make them infinite. And thus we fail in every 
attempt to make a personal God infinite. David, in speaking 
of the God Jehovah, says, "If I descend into hell, behold thou 
art there." Then lie would not find the Devil there; for two 
infinite beings could not be found there. And, if God's dwell- 
-place is in hell as well as in heaven, it can make but little 
difference which of the two places we go to, as we are told oar 
happiness will consist in being in his presence. 

The defenders of a personal God sometimes have recourse 
to an illustrative argument. They tell us that thesun is a Local, 
circumscribed body, and yet shines to a boundless extent. It is 
here assumed that the rays of the sun are a part of the sun ; but 
this is not true. They once constituted a part of the sun, it 



NATURAL AND MORAL EVIL EXPLAINED. 255 

is true ; but to assume that the}^ are still a part of the sun, 
after the}' have left it, is as absurd as to assume that the breath 
is still a part of the human body after it has escaped from the 
mouth. Thus every argument and every illustration fail to es- 
tablish the self-evident absurdfty of a personal God of the or- 
thodox world being an infinite being ; or, in other words, of 
their conception of a God conforming to the teachings of science 
and good sense. 

Those who assume the existence of a personal God must hold 
him accountable for all the crime and all the misery existing in 
the world. For such a God could not be controlled or circum- 
scribed in his actions by any arbitrary laws ; and hence could 
and should, by personal interference, put a stop to all the 
crime, misery, suffering, and wrong of every description exist- 
ing on earth ; and the fact that he does not do it we hold to be 
prima-facie evidence that there is no personal God, but that 
every thing is governed by fixed, immutable laws, which control 
God himself, and which no God can alter. 

Note. — We have shown in the twelve preceding chapters that all the leading doc- 
trines of Christianity are wrong, — from that of a belief in divine revelation to that of 
the conception of a personal Gr6d. Hence a better religion is needed for this age. 



CHAPTEE XLV. 

EVIL, NATUEAL AND I0BAL, EXPLAINED. 

The problem of the origin of evil has been the great theo- 
! logical puzzle to all theologians and with all religious systems, 
j and has turned the heads of more good people, and sent more 
\ devout Christians to the lunatic asylum, than any other theo- 
i logical question, excepting that of endless punishment ; and 
; yet modern science, which furnishes the principles for solving 
i all the c ' holy mysteries ' ' and miracles embodied in the reli- 
, gious creeds and Bibles of the past ages, shows the question to 
j be quite simple and easily understood. The true signification 
] of the word evil, in a moral sense, can be expressed in a few 
words. It is only another name for imperfection or negation. 



256 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

It is the negative pole of the great moral battery; and with- 
out it the battery could not be run. And without it there 
could be no moralit} r , no moral principle or accountability, while 
man exists upon the present animal plane. In fact, morality 
without evil would be an unmeaning word. Evil is a state of 
imperfection running through every vein of nature, from the 
igneous rock to the brain of man. Some writers attempt to 
discriminate between natural and moral evil ; but there is no 
dividing line. Moral evil is as natural as any phenomenon in 
nature, and is, strictly speaking, the phenomenal action of the 
brain. Moral evil is governed as rigidly by natural laws as 
physical evil ; because (as science demonstrates) it has its basis 
in man's moral nature. And, practically speaking, there will 
be neither natural nor moral evil when nature (now in a crude 
state) grows to a state of maturity. Evil or imperfection, 
which now characterizes every thing, diminishes in its ratio to 
goodness or perfection as we ascend from inanimate matter to 
man, — the crowning work of nature. The theological world 
assumes that man alone bears the impress of imperfection, and 
that his imperfection is restricted principally to his moral 
action. " Man alone is imperfect: all else bears the mark 
of divine perfection." So says Archbishop Whately. But the 
converse assumption is nearer true : Man is the crowning work 
of nature, and his moral attributes constitute the keystone of 
the arch. He is occasionally erratic, and often wicked, but not 
universally and continually so, like some of the lower animal 
tribes. The hyena will murder at all times when opportunity 
offers ; but man onty occasionally, and when driven to it by the 
pressure of circumstances. All monkeys are thieves; but only 
a small portion of the genus homo are such. Man derives all 
his propensity to evil and wickedness from the lower animals. 
His propensity to rob La exhibited in the eagle; his inclination 
bo steal, in the monkey ; his disposition to murder, in the hyena. 
alligator, rattlesnake, &c. ; his disposition to enslave, in the red 
ant, which makes a slave of the black ant. as has often been 
lived by naturalists. Such was the wickedness among the 
lower animals iu their earlier stage of development, that, by 
theft, robbery, and murder, they effected the entire extinction 



NATURAL AND MORAL EVIL EXPLAINED. 257 

of many species of animals. And if we descend still lower, and 
learn the practical history of the mineral kingdom, we shall find 
that its operations are marked by a still more ruinous and de- 
structive form of evil. The hideous and devouring earthquake ; 
the heaving and overflowing volcano, bumng whole cities beneath 
its deep and merciless waves of running fire ; the roaring and 
furious tornado, destroying hundreds of dwellings, and dooming 
the inmates to a terrible death ; and the swift-sped lightning, 
which, with no note of warning, strikes down hundreds of peo- 
ple every year, — all these violent operations of nature are the 
manifestation of evil, and a proof that imperfection exists 
everywhere. And man is the last and least manifestation of 
this multifarious destructive outburst of nature ; and he will 
never outgrow it, and escape its operation entirely, till all 
nature arrives at manhood. While nature is imperfect, man 
will be imperfect ; for he is a child of nature, and all things 
move forward in correlated order. He can, however (and it is 
a necessity of his nature that he should) , battle with opposing 
forces, and modify the circumstances around him. His nature 
impels him to this as naturally as it urges him to eat food when 
hungry ; but, as at present constituted and situated, it will be 
the work of time to rid the earth of moral evil. The only way 
to accomplish the extinction of evil is to labor for the elevation 
of the whole race. We are only rowing against the current in 
attempting to put down evil with our present system of moral 
ethics, which treats the criminal as a wicked being instead of 
an unfortunate, sin-sick brother. He should be sent to a moral 
1 hospital instead of to the gallows, the jail, and the dungeon. 
He should be treated as an unfortunate brother, rather than as 
a being to be spurned from society as a viper. He should be 
treated kindly, not cruelly ; fed, and not starved. His moral 
nature should be warmed by affection, and not congealed by 
frowns. His instinctive respect for virtue should be developed 
by a sound moral education, and not crushed by pursuing him 
with a malignant spirit. Moral evils must be treated as the 
fruits of the imperfections of our nature, and not as the product 
of sin-punishing devils, who first originate and stimulate crimes, 
and then join with God in punishing the criminal with fiendish 

■1 



258 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

cruelty ; thus applying a remedy which is a thousand times worse 
than the disease. 

The science of phrenology explains most beautifully the cause 
and nature of sin or crime, and demonstrates that it is simply 
the perverted or unbalanced action of the natural faculties of the 
mind. Combativeness, when excessively developed or unduly 
excited, prompts to quarrels and righting ; destructive ness, 
under similar circumstances, leads to war and bloodshed ; 
amativeness, when not property restrained, leads to the various 
forms of licentiousness ; over-active acquisitiveness is the 
main-spring in most cases of theft and robbery, and all crimes 
committed for the acquisition of property or money. And other 
crimes are prompted by the over-active condition of these and 
other mental faculties unrestrained by the moral faculties. 
Every act and every species of crime are in this way most satis- 
factorily accounted for by this now generally received and 
thoroughly established science of mental philosophy ; so that 
"the mystery of godliness," comprehended in the word sm, 
which for ages perplexed the student of theology, is now unrav- 
eled and understood by the scientific men of the age, and 
known to have a natural basis and natural origin. And this 
all-important discovery has driven the old orthodox Devil from 
the arena of human action. He no longer walks "to and fro in 
the earth, seeking whom he may devour." He is dead — 
dead, — killed by the sledge-hammer of science. And yet the 
fifty thousand clergymen who still " defend the faith once deliv- 
ered to the saints " are (many of them) so far behind the march 
of human progress that the news of the mortal exit of his Sa- 
tanic Majesty seems not yet to have reached them; or, if it 
has, it is ])( 'cause they are unwilling to lose the services of a 
long-cherished and highly valued friend that they refuse to 
credit the report of his demise. Take away their Devil, and 
their whole theological scaffolding (alls to the ground. Revivals 
could no more he carried on without his aid, than a watch could 
he kepi running without a main-spring. And with the de- 
parture of the Devil must go "salvation by Christ," as there Is 
then nothing, in a theological sense, to be saved from. Ji 
an Important fact, of which the clergy seem to be ignorant, that 



NATURAL AND MORAL EVIL EXPLAINED. 259 

the march of science has exploded all their old theological dog- 
mas. Phrenology has banished the Devil ; physiology explains 
the modus operandi of repentance ; psycholog} r , the process of 
" getting religion ; " philosophy analyzes their Bible miracles ; 
geology has expanded their six da}'s of creation into six thousand 
years ; astronomy has displaced Moses' theory of creation, 
and demolished St. John's little eight-b}'-ten heaven. (See 
Rev. chap. 21.) And yet the orthodox clergy refuse to shorten 
their creeds by leaving out these old, exploded dogmas. Like 
moles, they continue rooting and digging away among their 
must}' creeds, dogmas, and catechisms, seemingly unconscious 
that the sun of science is now shining with dazzling brilliancy in 
the moral heavens. Some of them manifest a tenacity in hold- 
ing on to musty and antiquated dogmas equal to that of the but- 
cher' s dog in the army which seized a slaughtered ox by the 
caudal appendange, with the intention of monopolizing the meat, 
and held on with a ' ' manly grip ' ' till limb after limb had been 
torn off, and piece after piece had been cut away from the body 
by the hungry soldiers, and nothing was left but the tail and 
the backbone ; and then his canine majesty growled at passers- 
by, as much as to say, " I am master of the situation." The 
fossilized clergy are "masters of the situation," while the old 
orthodox carcass is now minus evevj part but the tail and naked 
backbone, to which they cling with a deathly grasp worthy of a 
better cause. They remind us of the hotel-keeper in Vermont, 
who, in answer to the interrogatories of some travelers, stated 
that he did not keep any kind of food for either men or horses. 
"What in the name of God, then, do you keep?" inquired 
one of the hungry guests. He replied, " I keep Union Hotel." 
The stand-still clergy still keep the old theological hotel minus 
any' spiritual food, or supplied only with old salt junk handed 
down from the camp of Moses or Father Abraham. 

A word more with respect to the origin of evil : Is it not 
strange that Christians should den}' their God to be the author 
of evil, when it is expressly so declared in their Bible? "I 
make peace, and I create evil. I Jehovah do all these things." 

Here is the positive declaration that God is the author of evil ; 
and, if it were not thus unequivocally taught, we could prove 



260 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

that the Bible teaches this doctrine indirectly by various texts. 
If " God made every thing that was made," then he either 
made evil or the author of evil, whether that was a devil or a 
serpent or a fallen angel ; and this is substantially the same 
thing as originating evil, — to originate the author of evil. We 
challenge refutation of the proposition. But a philosophical 
analysis of the question will show there is no such thing as evil 
in either the abstract or absolute sense. Good and evil are but 
relative terms, like heat and cold, light and darkness, &c. 
There is no distinct line of demarkation between any of these 
correlative terms. It is impossible to tell where one ends, and 
the other begins. And then there is no act but that may 
become either right or wrong under different circumstances. 
The Bible says, "Thou shalt not kill." But the man who 
should see an assassin pointing a pistol to the head of his wife, 
or a dagger to her breast, and refrain from killing him as the 
only means of saving her life, would be virtually himself a mur- 
derer. u Thou shalt not steal" (Exod. xx.) ; and yet stealing 
would become a moral right, as well as a physical necessity, to 
avoid starvation. And so of all other acts called crime and 
sin : they ma} r become absolute virtues. How foolish, there- 
fore, to erect inflexible standards for human action or conduct ! 
And then it should be noted that what is regarded as sin in one 
age or country ma} T be imposed as a moral or religious duty in 
another. It is a sin to disbelieve the Koran in Arabia, and a 
sin to believe it in America. It is a sinful act to disbelieve the 
Christian Bible in this country, and a moral and religions duty 
in Japan. It is blasphemy and atheism to disbelieve in Jehovah 
and Jesus Christ in this country, but a still greater blasphemy 
and sin to believe in them in Arabia. And thus all human 
action- are modified by the circumstances under which, and the 
locality in which, they are committed. 



TRUE SALVATION. 261 



CHAPTER XLVI. 

TEUE SALTATION, OR THE RATIONAL VIEW OE SIN. 

We will now attempt to show what reason, science, and 
God's eternal Bible teach as the nature of sin and its conse- 
quences. The orthodox world represents sin to be a personal 
affront against a personal God. But we take a broader, and, 
we think, a more rational view of the matter. We believe that 
no act of ours, whether good or bad, can possibly affect an infi- 
nite, omnipresent, and impersonal Deity in any way whatever. 
Nothing we can do can either offend or gratify such a being. 
He is infinitely too far removed from our little narrow sphere 
of action. But every thing we do can and does affect ourselves^ 
and generally our friends and all connected with us. Every 
wrong act we perform inflicts an injury upon our moral con- 
sciousness, and a wound upon our sense of right, and inflicts a 
lasting injury upon our moral dignity, if it does not create 
a painful sense of wrong. And, when once committed, no re- 
pentance, no forgiveness, no prayer, no atonement, no pardon, 
can do any thing toward arresting the baneful effects, or toward 
healing the wound it has inflicted upon our moral consciousness, 
or the injury it has inflicted upon others. Hence we never ask 
for forgiveness, nor rely upon any atonement by men, animals, 
or Gods to cancel the effects, or mitigate the wrong, or alleviate 
the injury in the case. When you put your finger into fire, and 
burn it, you violate one of God's laws written upon your own 
constitution, —the law of self-preservation; and it inflicts a 
wound which the longest and loudest prayer ever uttered can 
do nothing towards healing. The effect will remain until healed 
by the working of nature's inherent laws, A similar effect is 
produced by every wrong act you inflict upon 3-ourseif or your 
fellow-beings. It inflicts a wound which is beyond the reach of 



262 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

prayer, pardon, repentance, or forgiveness. It must work its 
natural cure, as in the case of physical injury. All bodily 
suffering comes through the mind, and hence affects the mind 
as well as the body ; and every moral wrong we commit in- 
flicts punishment or suffering upon the moral feelings. Hence 
it will be seen that sin does not have to wait for God to point 
out the penalty or punishment, but contains its own punish- 
ment, which no power in heaven or earth can arrest, avert, 
or set aside. This is evidently the only true doctrine respecting 
the punishment for sin ; and it is the only doctrine that can 
stop the commission of crime, and the only doctrine that 
can ever reform the world ; for, while the people are taught 
that sin can be atoned for by any power in heaven or earth, they 
will the more easily yield to the temptations to commit sin. 
They will feel that this doctrine is a kind of license for sin : at 
least it weakens the motive for abstaining from sin. For if a 
man ma} T lead a life of crime, sin, wickedness, and debauchery, 
destitute of all moral principle, for ninety-nine 3-ears, as ortho- 
doxy teaches, and then have the effect entirely canceled, and 
the sin entirely erased from his soul, by one short hour of prayer 
and repentance and forgiveness, and by acknowledging his faith 
in the atoning blood of Christ, and then stand before God 
without a moral blot upon his soul, all purified and ready to 
join the pure in heart — the white-robed angels who lived a life 
of self-denial and purity — in shouting glory to God, where 
is the motive for leading a virtuous life? It is entirely too weak 
to restrain from the commission of crime while the temptation 
is as strong as we usually find it in all countries, especially as 
there is apparently a large premium offered to sinners. Christ 
says, "There is more joy in heaven over one sinner that repent- 
eth than over ninety and nine just persons who need no 
pentance" (Luke xv. 7). No wonder that sin abounds in all 
Christian countries; and it always will abound while people are 
taught such pernicious doctrines. Therefore we hold the doc- 
trines of repentance, atonement, forgiveness, &c, to be all 
wrong. They are subversive of the first principles of moral 
justice, and pernicious in their effects upon society. I. el the 
wrong-doer, instead of being taught these pernicious doctrin 



TRUE SALVATION. 263 

be instructed in the true system of salvation, which will teach 
him there is no possibility of evading or escaping the punitive 
effects of wrong-doing ; that every wrong act he commits will 
inevitably drive the iron into his soul, — the two-edged sword 
of moral conviction ; and that the blood of no goats or no Gods 
can do any thing toward washing away the sin, or mitigating the 
punishment. And let him be rescued also from the pernicious 
error of the churches, that u sin is a sweet morsel to be rolled 
under the tongue," or that " there is a pleasure in the commis- 
sion of sin." We hold no such views ; we believe in no such 
doctrines. We do not believe there is any real pleasure in the 
commission of a moral wrong of any kind. We believe that only 
a life of virtue is productive of real happiness. Let the wrong- 
doer be taught this moral lesson ; and let him be also taught that 
every humane and virtuous act of this life will expand his soul, 
and elevate him to a higher plane of happiness, and bring him 
one step nearer the door of the heavenly kingdom. Let the 
world of mankind all be taught these beautiful and soul- elevating 
doctrines, which many -now know by experience to be golden 
truths ; and we will soon witness a great moral revolution and 
renovation in society by the propagation of these doctrines. We 
shall soon see the proof that our system of faith, embracing these 
beautiful, philosophical, and elevating doctrines, is much better 
calculated to moralize and reform the world than the morally 
weak and unjust doctrines of repentance, atonement, and par- 
don now daily preached from the Christian pulpits. Many cases 
could be cited to show that they do have a pernicious influence. 
I will adduce one example : When that Christian emperor, Con- 
stantino, had murdered his wife, son, nephew, and several other 
relatives, he raised his hands toward heaven, and exclaimed, 
t% The blood of Christ cleanseth from all sin." Here is an ex- 
ample of the pernicious and demoralizing effect of the Christian 
doctrines of atonement and forgiveness. We repeat, then, that 
such doctrines are demoralizing, as they must operate to retard 
the progress of truth and true religion, and the moral reforma- 
tion of the world. People should be taught that it is as impossi- 
ble to escape the penalty for sin or wrong-doing as it is to escape 
the darts of death ; and that any act of forgiveness or atonement 



2G4 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

by some other being is onty calculated to aggravate the wrong, 
and augment the sin, and open the door for a future commission 
of the act. All should understand that there is no one to par- 
don sins, and no savior but themselves. " The new religion,' ' 
as it is sometimes called, — though it is the oldest religion in the 
world, being founded in the moral and religious nature of man, 
and an outgrowth of his moral, religious, and spiritual ele- 
ments, — this religion, which is the religion of all the truly 
enlightened and scientific minds of the age, teaches that every 
person must be his own savior ; that every man and woman 
must work out their own salvation, not with fear and trembling, 
however, but with joy and rejoicing. Hence we ask no bleed* 
ing saviors, no atonements, no acquittals by pardon or forgive- 
ness. We offer no such briber}^ for crime or sin, — no such 
allurements and inducements for leading a life of vice ; for 
many can testif}-, from their own experience, that they were more 
easily tempted from the path of virtue when they believed in tli 
old heathenish, morally deformed, and morally dwarfing doc- 
trines. On the other hand, they have felt much more strongly 
wedded to a life of virtue, and more powerfully restrained from 
wrong-cluing since they abandoned these pernicious doctrines, 
and embraced the healthful, beautiful, and elevating doctrines 
of the " Ilarmonial Philosophy." This system teaches Ave have 
to suffer the penalty in full for every wrong act we commit ; that 
we can noi escape in any case by either repentance, atonerm 
or pardon ; that we can not swim oil' to heaven through the 
blood of a murdered or crucified God, and leave our sins behind 
unpunished) or pack them on the back of a savior as the J< 
did theirs on the back of a goat. It teaches us that the penalty 
is ns certain as the commission of the crime; because one is the 
cause, and the other the effect. Hence we could as easily replace 
a lost Mini, torn off in the field of battle, by prayer, or stop the 
descending lightning from splintering yonder tree into i 
thousand fragments, as to avert or set aside the penalty \'<>v 
crime by u supplicating the throne of grace.' ' We hold thai 
every WTOng act we commit, if it does not destroy our happin 

at the time, and operate as a barbed arrow sticking in the soul, 
will at least weaken our capacity for happiness in the future, 



TRUE SALVATION. 2G5 

Weaken our moral strength and resolution to abstain from 
crime, weaken our natural detestation of crime, and weaken our 
moral ability to resist the temptation to commit the same and 
other crimes in the future, and finally destroy our morn 1 manhood 
and true dignity. Now, here is a series of powerful motives for 
eschewing evil, and leading a life of virtue, which will operate 
to arrest that river of crime and iniquity now flowing through 
all Christian countries as soon as the people are taught those 
rational and beautiful doctrines in lieu of those weak and foolish 
incentives to virtue which are taught them from the Christian 
pulpit. They possess a much greater moral force than the fear 
of angry Gods and horned Devils. Reader ponder these maxims. 
The, True Theory of Reform. — It requires but a few words 
to show what kind of moral teaching is required to reform the 
world. As happiness is the predominant desire and inalienable 
right of every human being, all aim to pursue that course best 
calculated to attain it; but, as men are now organized and cir- 
cumstanced, they often pursue a course of life which infringes 
upon and destroys the happiness of others: and some of them 
commit acts known as crimes, which are simply trespasses upon 
the rights, peace, and happiness of their neighbors. If* iu thus 
pursuing happiness, they must destroy the happiness of others, 
then it follows that the happiness of others is incompatible with 
their own. If so, then God has made a serious blunder in 
making one man's happiness depend upon destroying the hap- 
piness of others ; and, as their happiness would depend equally 
upon destroying his, the happiness of all would thus be de- 
stroyed. Hence the theor} r won't work. It follows, then, that 
men lead a life of crime calculated to destroy the happiness 
of others, because they are ignorant of the fact that they can 
pursue a course of life that will secure their own happiness 
without destroying that of others. All that is necessary to 
reform them, therefore, is to convince them of this fact. This 
is the true theory, and the whole theory, of reform. And when 
people become acquainted with the modern discovery in moral 
philosophy, which teaches us that we can not attain to complete 
happiness without consulting the happiness of others in every 
act which affects them, there will be a double motive for leading 



266 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

a virtuous and honorable life. Even Christian professors will 
profit by it when they find that the grasping avarice which 
prompts them to try to monopolize wealth, and thus withhold 
the means of comfort and happiness from their neighbors, is 
not the way to attain real happiness for themselves. When the 
glorious era arrives that men will daily look after the happiness 
of others as well as their own, then we shall have a true reli- 
gion, and a true state of society, and a happy world. 



CHAPTER XLVII. 

THE BIBLE SANCTIONS EVERY SPECIES OF CRIIE. 

u Be ye perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect " (Matt. 
v. 48) . All Christian professors admit that this perfection is to 
be attained by following his practical example, and that the way 
to become acquainted with this practical example is to read 
the Bible. Let us see, then, where a practical compliance with 
this precept, as thus understood, will lead us. If the God of 
the Bible is to be accepted as our "heavenly Father," then a 
compliance with this precept will leave no crime uncommitted, 
and no sin not perpetrated ; for he is represented as either 
committing or sanctioning every species of crime, wickedness, 
and immorality known to society in the age in which the Bible 
was written. That the truth of this statement may not be 
called in question, we will proceed to bring forward evidence to 
prove it. 

I. The Bible sanctions Murder. 

We find a scriptural warrant for the highest crime known to 
the law, — that of murder. God is represented as saying to 
his holy people, * Go ye out and slay every man his brother, 
every man his companion, and every man his neighbor " (Exocl. 
xxxii. 27). And, relative to the dissenter from the faith, lie 
is represented as saying, "Ye shall stone him with stones that 
he die." Now, if such texts arc not calculated to foster the 
spirit of murder, and to extinguish the natural repugnance to 
Cruelty and bloodshed in the human mind, we can conceive 



THE BIBLE SANCTIONS MURDER. 267 

of no language that would have such an effect, especially when 
it is taken in connection with Christ's injunction, " He that hath 
not a sword, let him sell his coat, and buy one." 

And the practical lives of Christian professors, from the 
earliest establishment of the Church, furnishes proof of the 
demoralizing influence of such texts as these upon the readers 
of the Bible. These injunctions to murder and slaughter have 
been faithfully obeyed ; and the effect has been to submerge 
Christendom in a sea of blood. Look, for proof, at the war 
among the churches for many 3-ears about the doctrine of the 
Eucharist, which resulted in the destruction of three hundred 
thousand lives ; the fight about images, in which fifty thousand 
men, women, and children were murdered ; the war of a dozen 
churches against the sect of the Manicheans in the ninth cen- 
tury (A.D. 845) about some trivial doctrine of the Christian 
\ creed, and which left on the battle-field no less than a hundred 
thousand murdered human beings ; the Church schism, in the 
time of John Huss and Jerome of Prague, followed by the war 
of the Hussites, which resulted in a bloody slaughter of a hun- 
dred and fifty thousand fellow-Christians ; the war known as 
"The Holy Inquisition," established in the year 1208, made a 
record in its history of human butchery of two hundred thou- 
sand Christian professors, who had to atone in blood for assum- 
ing the liberty to differ from the popular creed ; and, finally, 
I the Thirty Years' war which strewed the earth with bloody 
corpses to the frightful number of five millions of human be- 
ings. The whole makes a sum total of eighteen millions, a 
1 large portion of which were Christian professors, — all the work 
of Christian hands and Christian churches, professed followers 
of the "Prince of peace." But, if the text quoted above 
1 means any thing (requiring his followers to buy swords) , he 
' appears also to have been the Prince of war^ All the bloody 
I tragedies cited above, which form but a small number of the 
i cases which indelibly stain the records of the Christian Church, 
- show how faithfully Christian professors have lived out the 
I demoralizing injunctions of their Bible, and prove that the 
I Book has been a powerful lever for evil as well as for good. 
Even the shocking cruelties displaj'ed in the execution of these 



268 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

bloody tragedies finds a warrant in the Bible. In their efforts 
to carry out the Bible injunction to exterminate heretics, no 
species of cruelty was left untried as a punishment for the 
honest dissenter from the faith. The sword of the Church was 
unsheathed, and plunged with a fierce and relentless ferocity 
into the bosoms and bowels of their neighbors and fellow- 
Christian professors, whose only offense was that of believing 
and worshiping God according to the dictates of their con- 
sciences. With a burning hatred for heretics, stimulated by 
reading the Bible injunction to put them to death in a cruel 
manner, they leaped upon them with the ferocity of tigers, and 
tortured them to death with every species of cruelty their in- 
genuity could invent. They tied them to the whipping-post, or 
chained them to the fiery fagot ; lacerated their bodies ; cut 
their tongues from their mouths ; tore their flesh from their 
bones with iron hooks, tongs, and pincers ; cut off their lips, 
and tore out their tongues, so that their piercing cries and 
heart-rending agonies could convey no intelligible sound ; tore 
their nails from their fingers, and thrust needles into the bleed- 
ing wounds ; melted red-hot metal, and poured it clown their 
throats; plucked out their eyes, and threw them to beasts; 
and, in some cases, their bodies were stretched upon the rack, 
and flayed alive, or torn limb from limb. But I forbear : the 
picture is too shocking. Oh that the waves of oblivion could 
roll over and cover such deeds of cruelty for ever ! I rejoice 
that the age for such atrocities is passed, and, I trust, can 
never return. I hope the churches will never again hold the 
reins of government, and shape all the laws of the country. 
The reason we do not witness, such horrible scenes now is, that 
many church-members have outgrown their Bible ; and, it' there 
are any who have not, they arc restrained by laws enacted by 
liberal minds of too milch good feeling and good sense to permit 
the churches to thus cruelly persecute each other, or those who 
conscientiously differ from them. 1 have stated that the shock- 
ing cruelties and barbarities practiced by Christians upon each 
other in past ages, find a warrant in the Bible. The act of 
David. ** the man after ( tod's own heart," in placing the children 
of Amnion under saws and harrows of iron 3 is scarcely equaled 



\ 



THE BIBLE SANCTIONS MUBDEB. 269 

in atrocity by any act recorded in the history of the Fiji can- 
nibals. It is revolting to every impulse of benevolence, every 
feeling of humanity, and all ideas of mercy or justice. And his 
wicked prayer, contained in the one hundred and ninth Psalm, 
breathes forth the same spirit. It is a series of fiendish impre- 
cations poured out upon the heads of those who differed from 
his creed, and worshiped a different God. We will quote some 
of his language : " Set thou a wicked man over him. Let there 
be none to extend mercy unto him ; let his children be father- 
less, and his wife a widow ; let his children be continually vaga- 
bonds, and beg ; let his posterity be cut off, and their name 
blotted out ; let the extortioner get all that he hath ; let his 
prayer become sin ; let the stranger spoil his land ; let not the 
sin of his mother be blotted out." 

Here is a series of most malignant imprecations issuing from 
a mind rankling and burning with a feeling of implacable re- 
venge, which is shocking to contemplate. It is murderous in 
its intent, and demoralizing in its effect upon those who accept 
it as being in accordance with the will of God. No person can 
contemplate the cruelties practiced b}^ this ' ' man of God ' ' 
upon his unoffending neighbors, or read his vengeful prayer, 
and accept it as emanating from " the man after God's own 
heart," without having his moral strength and resolution weak- 
ened, his moral standard lowered, and his ideas of the moral 
perfection of Deity degraded. And it was by deriving their 
conceptions of God from such a source that the Christian world 
has come to entertain such low, belittling, and dishonorable 
views of "the Suprerrie Ruler of the universe," as is shown in 
their preaching and their writings ; and it furnishes their chil- 
dren with a low and imperfect standard of morality. And this 
must alwaj's be the condition of things while the Bible, with its 
numerous bad examples and bad morality, is accepted as a guide 
by those teachers and preachers who mold the moral sentiments 
of the people. It will be observed, that " the man after God's 
own heart " invokes the divine vengeance upon innocent chil- 
dren, and prays that they may beg and starve, merely because 
their father was not a worshiper of the savage Jewish Jehovah ; 
which exhibits a mind devoid of all idea of justice or humanity. 



270 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

And this is a part of the religion of the Christian's "Holy 
Bible/' claimed as the product of divine inspiration. Now, 
who can not see that such a religion as this is calculated to en- 
gender bad feelings, bad ideas, and bad morals, and to repress 
the lofty moral emotions of the human mind ? 

II. The Bible sanctions Theft or Robbery. 

Robbeiy, practiced under the false pretense of borrowing, is 
another crime claiming the sanction of God's "Holy Word " and 
that c c Holy Being ' ' whose morarury we are taught to imitate by 
the injunction, " Be ye perfect, as your Father in heaven is 
perfect." We are told (in Exod. xii.) that the Jews, or He- 
brews, when leaving Egypt, robbed or stole from the inhabitants 
to such an extent, that "they spoiled the Egyptians," which 
leads to the conclusion that the robbery must have been very 
extensive : and for this merciless, wholesale robbeiy, they 
claimed the sanction of a just and righteous God ; for we are 
told he sanctioned or commanded the act. And this is a part 
of the code of morals "the Evangelical Christian Union" 
would have us incorporate into the Constitution of the United 
States ; but it is evident, from the facts already presented, that 
such an act would be a step towards barbarism. 

III. The Bible sanctions War. 
Another immoral feature of the Christian Bible, and one 
which proves it to be a relic or record of barbarism, and a very 
unsuitable book to "constitute the fountain of our laws, and 
the supreme rule of our conduct" (as recommended and urged 
by the Evangelical Christian Union), is found in its frequent 
sanction of human butchery; and a just and righteous God is 
represented its leaving his throne " in the heavens" to com/ 
down to take a part in their savage and bloody battles with 
different nations about their religious creeds. lie is represented 
as Btanding in the front ranks dining every battle fought by his 
" holy people." And. by long experience on the field of human 
butchery, he came to receive the military title of " God of War," 
M A Man of War," " The Lord of Hosts," &c. ; and his sue© 
in destroying human beings won for him the reputation of a great 



THE BIBLE SANCTIONS WAR. 271 

and skillful general, and placed him above other Gods in valor 
in his own estimation. He is represented as becoming so 
excited with anger, so blood-thirsty and revengeful in spirit, 
that he commanded his holy people to strike clown every living 
creature with the sword, whether men or animals. The word 
of command was ' ' to spare nothing ; " " save nothing alive 
that breathes." He is even represented as commanding the 
slaughter of innocent babes. The order was, so says Samuel 
(1 Sam. xv. 3), " Spare them not, but slay both men and 
women, infants and sucklings." Now, of all the blood-dyed 
mandates that ever issued from human lips, or was heard on the 
plains of human butchery, none ever excelled it in cruelty and 
malignant barbarity, claimed as coming from the mouth of a 
God of infinite justice and infinite benevolence. Think of the 
murder, in cold blood, of thousands of little innocent, prattling 
babies, who never lisped an evil word, or conceived an evil 
thought, in their lives ! and this by command of the loving 
Father of the human family ! Who believes it ? Who can 
believe it? Ay, who dare believe it, if he would escape the 
charge of blasphemy? Neither Nero nor Caligula was ever 
guilty of any thing so ruthless, so fiendish, so cruel, and so 
vindictive. And this is the God the Evangelical Union tell us 
the Constitution of the United States should recognize as the 
Supreme Ruler of nations. This is the Bible which they tell us 
should become " the fountain of our laws, and the supreme 
rule of our conduct." This is the religion which they are 
trying to revive and fasten upon us in this enlightened nine- 
teenth century. This is the religion we are required to believe 
came from a God of infinite justice, infinite mercy, and loving 
kindness, or be denounced as infidels, and be eternally damned. 
But could a person be more damned than to believe in such a 
religion? Now, those who have studied the philosophy and 
impressibility of the human mind know that no extortion or 
contortion of the language of the text, no symbolical or spirit- 
ual construction that can be forced upon it, can prevent the 
reading and believing a book from producing pernicious effects, 
which represents such barbarous deeds as having the divine 
sanction. Nothing can prevent it from exercising a demoral- 



272 TUB BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

izing influence upon a Christian community. The sooner, there- 
fore, it can cease to be placed in the hands of the heathen and 
the young people of Christian lands, and cease to constitute the 
basis of our religion, the better for the progress of true moralit} T , 
and a virtuous system of religion. 

IV. The Bible sanctions the Evil of Intemperance. 

There are a number of texts in the Bible, which, if human 
language can mean any thing, most unquestionably furnish a 
warrant for drunkenness, whatever might have been the intention 

of the writer ; and that they have had the effect to sustain 
and promote this evil, the practical histoiy of Christian coun- 
tries furnish proof that can not be gainsaid. That teacher 
of Bible morality — that wise man who is said to have received 
his wisdom directly from God, and must consequently be con- 
sidered good authority — is represented as saying, ct (Jive to him 
that is athirst, and wine to those of heavy heart. Let him drink, 
and forget his poverty, and remember his miseiy no more." 
Here we are virtually recommended to drown our sorrows, and 
benumb the pangs of poverty, by becoming dead drunk : for it 
is only after the inebriate has quaffed the contents of the intox- 
icating bowl, or swung the bottle to his lips till he becomes 
stupefied and insensible (i.e., "dead drunk"), that lie can 
"forget his poverty, and remember his misery no more." 
Wte dare not deny, then, that Solomon recommended a state 
of beastly intoxication as a means of drowning our troubles; 
for no other meaning can be forced upon the text than that 
which we have assigned it, without assuming an unwarrantable 
use of language. Away, then, with such a book as -'the 
source of moral and religious instruction for the heathen," or 
as ;i reading-boo]; for youth and children! The question is not 
what the Bible can be made 4 to teach ; but what is it naturally 
understood to teach, and what are the moral consequences of ><> 
understanding it ? 

And we find in Kxodus a still more explicit license, not only 
[\)\- drinking, but for buying and selling, intoxicating drinks. 
It is proclaimed, upon the authority of Jehovah, " Thou shalt 
spend thy money for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or for 



THE BIBLE SANCTIONS INTEMPERANCE. 273 

strong drink, or for whatsoever thy soul lusteth after" (Deut. 
xiv. 26) . We are sometimes told, but without reliable authority, 
that the wine here referred to did not possess very intoxicating 
properties. But it will be observed that the text did not stop at 
wine, but " strong drink ; " thus leaving no doubt upon the mind 
of the reader but that they used strong liquors, even if we were 
warranted in assuming the wine was not of this character, 
which, however, we are not, and which we know is not true : 
for, although like the wine of the grape in other countries, it 
would not intoxicate while new, yet in that warm climate^ as 
travelers affirm, it will ferment in a few hours. It is evident, 
then, that wine was one of their intoxicating beverages in 
addition to " strong drinks." And here we find a license for 
bu}ing and selling and using both in a book which the ortho- 
dox churches would have us adopt as "the fountain of our 
laws, and the supreme rule of our conduct," ostensibly for the 
improvement of the morals of the people ; when it is known to 
unbiased investigators of the subject that these and similar 
texts have been a stumbling-block in the progress of the tem- 
perance reform among that class of people who take the Bible 
as it reads without studying the art of extracting the old mean- 
ing with the clerical force-pump, and coining a new meaning 
of their own especially adapted to the occasion, — an art 
studied and practiced by the spiritually blinded devotees of 
all " the Holy Bibles" which God is assumed to have inspired 
for the salvation of the human race. I will cite one case in 
proof of the statement that a Bible containing such texts as I 
have cited is calculated to do much mischief in the way of 
retarding the temperance reform by furnishing the plainest 
authority for drinking and trafficking in intoxicating liquors. A 
friend, upon whom I can rely, related to me the following case : 
A man addicted to intemperate habits was converted to religion, 
and induced to sign the temperance pledge, partly by tin; influ- 
ence of a speaker who quoted from "the word of God " such 
texts as these: " Woe unto him who holds the bottle to his 
neighbor's mouth" (Ilab. ii. 15) ; " Wine is a mocker, and 
strong drink is raging" (Prov. xx. 1). But a few days after 
his conversion, as he was turning the leaves of the Bible, his 



274 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

eye accidentally caught sight of one of the texts I have quoted, — 
" Thou shalt spend thy money for strong drink," &c. Here 
he discovered that his Bible and his God both declared that 
buying and drinking intoxicating beverages was all right. It 
was enough. His resolution gave way ; his firmness was un- 
manned, his moral manhood prostrated, his pledge overruled ; 
and, in less than two hours, he was again lying in the ditch 
"dead drunk.' ' Here is a proof of the mischief that can be 
wrought by one single text upon those who have accepted the 
Bible as " the supreme rule of their conduct." You may pro- 
claim the evil of intemperance with the tongue of a Cicero, or 
paint it with the pencil of a Raphael, and muster all the texts 
you can find in the book condemning the practice, } r et one such 
text as I have quoted will poison the moral force of it all while 
the Bible is read and adored as "the rule of their conduct." 
As one drop of belladonna or prussic acid will poison a whole 
pint of water, in like manner will one immoral text, when found 
in a book accepted by the people as their highest authorit}' in 
practical morals, have the effect to neutralize the moral force of 
every sound precept that may be found in the book. It is use- 
less, and labor comparatively lost, for a book or a moral teacher 
to inculcate good precepts, while it is known the} T are morale- 
capable of teaching or preaching bad ones. One spark of fire 
is sufficient to explode a powder-magazine. Bad precepts and 
bad examples are both very contagious in a moralty undeveloped 
and unenlightened age ; and their pernicious effects can not be 
wholly counteracted or prevented by any number of precepts of 
an opposite character. 

But we are told the precepts above quoted are in the Old 
Testament, and not the New, which is now accepted as higher 
authority. But then it should be borne in mind, that the Old 
Testament is still being printed and bound with the New as 
apart of u the Holy Bible," and " God's perfect revelation to 
man" lor w4 the guidance of his moral conduct." It is still 
circulated both in Christian and heathen countries by the mil- 
lion with the New, and as of equal authority with the New Tes- 
tament. It takes both to make "the Holy Bible." It will he 
in vain, then, to plead any extenuation or apology for the iinmo- 



THE BIBLE SANCTIONS CRIME. 975 

ralities of the Old Testament on this ground. They will both 
stand or fall together. The "new dispensation" could not 
stand a day without the Old Testament as a basis. And then, 
when we push our investigations a step further, we find the 
New Testament lending its sanction to most of the evils and 
crimes wliich are supported by the Old Testament ; and among 
this number is that under review, — the vice or sin of intemper- 
ance. Paul, one of the principal founders and expounders of 
the religion of the New Testament, and one of the leading 
examples and teachers of its morals, in his letter of exhortation 
to Timothy, advises him to " drink no longer water, but take a 
little wine for the stomach's sake " (1 Tim. v. 23). As for the 
plea or purpose for which the intoxicating beverage was to be 
used on this occasion u for the stomach's sake," it is the same 
that dram-drinkers and drunkards have always had recourse to 
to justify the use of strong drink. It is always drunk for " the 
stomach's sake." And, when we find Christ himself converting 
a large quantity of water into wine (see John ii.), we must con- 
clude that the New Testament does not teach a system of 
morals calculated to arrest the sin of intemperance. Those, 
then, who wish still to continue floundering in the cesspool of 
drunkenness, can find in the New Testament, as well as the Old, 
a justification for this sin. 

V. The Crime of Slave-holding sanctioned by the Bible. 

The Bible contains a warrant for the perpetual enslavement 
of men, women, and children. It is well known to the pioneer- 
laborers in the antislavery reform, that this book constituted a 
strong bulwark in support of the system ; that it was one of 
the principal obstacles in the way of effecting its extermination. 
Its defenders quoted such texts as the following : "Of the 
heathen round about you, shall ye buy bondmen and bond- 
maids, and they shall be your possession for ever" (Lev. xxv. 
44). Among Christian professors, such positive and explicit 
license for the practice of slave-holding was hard to be set 
aside ; and it undoubtedly had an influence to perpetuate the 
accursed system of slavery. 



276 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

VI. The Bible sanctions Polygamy. 

The practice of polygamy is indorsed by the Christian Bible. 
It is frequently sanctioned in the Old Testament, both b} r pre- 
cept and example, while it is nowhere condemned by the Book, 
either in the Old or New Testament. This fact makes Mor- 
monism an impregnable institution ; and this is the reason it 
bids defiance to the efforts of a Christian nation to put it down. 
It is a Bible institution. Hence a Bible-believing nation dare 
not attack it. The hand of the government is powerless to put 
it down, because it is justified by the " Holy Book." Hence 
it continues to exist, a stigma upon the nation. Were it as ex- 
plicitly and strongly condemned by the Bible as idolatry is, it 
would have been banished from the country long ago. 

VII. Licentiousness is sanctioned by the Bible. 

It can hardly be wondered at that so many Christian profess- 
ors fall victims to licentious habits, as is evident from reports 
almost daily published in the periodicals, from which one trav- 
eler has collected more than two thousand cases of priests, the 
professed teachers of morality, who have fallen victims to the 
vice of illegal sexual intercourse within a few }^ears ; and prob- 
ably the number whose deeds are never brought to light is much 
greater. As we have already remarked, this licentiousness 
among Bible believers and Bible teachers is no cause of wonder 
when we reflect that it is taught in their Bible, both by example 
and precept, and even, we are told, commanded by Jehovah 
himself. In the thirty-first chapter of Numbers it is written, 
that the Lord commanded Moses to slay all the Midianites. 
except the women and girls who " had never known man." 
amounting to about thirty thousand. They were even ordered 
to kill every male among the little ones ; and it is declared they 
left " nothing alive that breathes," except the thirty thousand 
maids saved to gratify the lust of those murderous libertines. 
Who that lias any mercy, justice, or refinement in their nature, 
can believe that such cruelty and licentiousness was the work 
of a righteous God? Christian professors contemplate these 
revolting pictures with an anxious desire to save the credit of 



THE BIBLE SANCTIONS CBIME. 277 

the Book, until, by dint of determination to believe (for they 
are afraid even to doubt) , they finally persuade themselves, that, 
somehow or other, they must be right, notwithstanding their 
revolting nature. They conclude they don't understand them, 
or that it is our fine moral sensibilities, and our natural love of 
virtue, that is at fault. And thus our moral manhood is dead- 
ened and sacrificed to our barbarous religion. It is an evident 
fact, and a sorrowful truth, that the moral sensibilities of all 
Christendom are more or less blunted and seared in this way, 
and their standard of virtue lowered. Such is the demoralizing 
influence of the ' ' Holy Book ' ' when idolized and regarded as 
the source of our morals, and " the supreme rule of our con- 
duct." It is evident we never can reach that elevated standard 
of morals and true refinement which is the natural outgrowth 
of civilization till the Bible is lowered to a more subordinate 
position, and is no longer allowed to shape our morals, and 
mold our religion, and retard our civilization. The texts I 
have cited are but samples of many similar passages which 
evince a sickly, licentious state of morals amongst " the Lord's 
holy people." B} r the moral code of Moses and Jehovah, a 
Jew was authorized to seize a beautiful woman (if he should 
see one amongst the captives taken in war) , and take her to 
his house for his wife ; but, if he finds upon trial that she don't 
suit him, then he can turn her out, and let her go whither she 
will. He was licensed to turn her adrift upon the cold charities 
of the world. "If it shall be that thou find no delight in her, 
then thou shalt let her go whither she will" (Deut. xxi. 14). 
It does not appear that her wishes were consulted in any case. 
She was a captive at first, and a slave to the end. And these 
hard-hearted, licentious men were " God's holy people." Those 
pious and devout Christians who are so inveterately opposed to, 
and horrified at, " Free-Lovism " should not let it be known the}' 
believe in the Bible, lest they should get into the same difficulty 
the Rev. Mr. Hitchkiss did while iii Arabia. Having stated to 
a Mahomedan that there was a class of people in America 
known as " Free-Lovers," and that they were infidels and Spir- 
itualists, the disciple of the Koran remarked, in reply, u I sup- 
pose you are a Free-Lover also." — "What makes you entertain 



278 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

that supposition ? " asked the reverend. "Because," said the 
Mussulman, u 3*011 are a believer in the Christian Bible; and I 
have observed, by reading it, that its leading men were practical 
-Free-Lovers.' The wise Solomon was so highly esteemed by 
God, that he opened to him the fountain of wisdom ; and 
hence he must have been looked up to by the Jews as a leading 
authority in matters of religion and morals, and an example to 
be followed in practical life ; and he practiced 4 Free-Lovism,' 
or licentiousness, on a very large scale. His subjects and vic- 
tims were numbered b} T the thousand ; and with three hundred 
of them he maintained no legal relation. Hence they were 
what are now called prostitutes. And his father David, c the 
man after God's own heart,' was also a ' Free-Lover,' and indi- 
rectly committed murder in order to increase his number of 
victims ; and Abraham, the father and founder of the Jewish 
nation, also belonged to that class. I suppose, therefore, you 
consider it all right." The reverend gentleman replied, "I 
believe it was right for them, but would not be right for us." 
--Then," said the Mahomedan, " you believe that moral prin- 
ciples change, — that what is right to day may be wrong to- 
morrow, and vice versa. Now, it is evident, that, if the}* can 
change once, they can change again, and may thus be perpetu- 
ally changing ; so that it would be impossible to know what 
true morality is, for it would be one thing to-day and another to- 
morrow. I hold that the principles of morality are perfect, and 
hence can not change without becoming immorality." Thus 
reasoned the -- unconverted heathen ; " and thus closed his con- 
troversy with the Christian missionary. The reader can ju< 
which had the better end of the argument. 

VIII. 'I'm: Bible sanctions Wife-Catching, 

In the Book of. Judges (Judges xxi. 20) we learn that the Israel- 
ites of the tribe of Benjamin were instructed in the art of wife- 
catching. "Go and lie in wait in the vineyards ; and behold, 
if the daughters Of Shiloh eonie out to dance in dances, then 
conic ye out of the vineyards, and catch you every man a wife M 
(Judges xxi. 21). "And they did so." Now it was certainly 
lather shameful business for God's oracles to be engaged in, — 



THE BIBLE SANCTIONS CRIME. 279 

that of advising rude and lustful men to hide in ambush in the 
vineyards, and, when the}' saw the young maidens approaching, 
to pounce upon them while dancing, and cany or drag them 
off without a moment's warning. It was called catching a 
wife ; but, in this age of a higher moral development, it would 
not be designated by such respectful language, but would be 
placed in the list of crimes, and punished as a State-prison 
offense. 

IX. The Crimes of Treachery and Assassination. 

In the fourth chapter of Judges we find a case of barbarity 
related, comprising the double crime of treachery and murder, 
for which a parallel can scarcely be found in the annals of any 
heathen nation, and which appears to have received the approval 
of the Jewish Jehovah. It is exhibited in the history of Jael, 
the wife of Heber the Kenite. We read, that as a poor fugi- 
tive by the name of Sisera was fleeing from " the Lord's holy 
people," who were pursuing him with uplifted swords with the 
determination to kill him, not for any crime whatever, but 
because he professed a different religion, and refused to wor- 
ship their cruel God (for they seemed to consider themselves 
authorized by their God to exterminate all nations who dissented 
from their creed) , — as this fugitive was filing from the swords 
of the worshipers of Jehovah, Jael went out to meet him 
(Sisera), and said unto him, " Turn in, my lord ; turn in to 
me. Fear not." And, when he had turned in unto her in the 
tent, she covered him with a mantle, and feigned much pity for 
him ; and, when he asked for a little water, she gave him milk : 
but, as soon as he had fallen asleep, " she took a nail of the 
tent and a hammer, and went softly unto him, and smote the nail 
into his temple, and fastened it into the ground." Who can read 
this deed of treachery and cruelt} 7 without emotions of horror, 
and thrilling chill}' sensations at the heart? And yet Jehovah, 
the God of Israel, is represented as saying, "Blessed above 
women shall Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, be " (Juclg. v. 
24) . Now, what is this but a premium offered for treachery and 
cold-blooded murder? I believe, with Lord Bacon, that " it is 
better to believe in no God than to believe in one possessing 



280 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

dishonorable traits of character;" and I can not see how it 
would be possible to ascribe more dishonorable traits of charac- 
ter to any being than are ascribed to the Jewish Jehovah. And 
this is the God the orthodox world wants put into the Constitu- 
tion of the United States ; but most unfortunate for our progress 
in morals and civilization would it be to adopt such a measure. 
And this is the book which the churches are constantly appealing 
to the people for aid to circulate among the heathen as neces- 
sary to improve their morals, and save their souls ; but no other 
book could be put into their hands so completely calculated to 
deaden and obliterate every feeling of humanity, every natural 
impulse of justice and mercy, and kindle feelings of murder and 
revenge. Such a book should not be admitted into their families 
to corrupt their natural sense of right and justice. 

I will cite another case evincing the same spirit, and teaching 
the same kind of moral lesson. We are told in Judges (chap, 
iii.) that the Lord sent a man by the name of Ehud to murder 
Eglon, King of Moab, and sent him with a lie upon his lips. 
As he came near to the king, he said unto him, " I have a 
message from God unto thee" (Judg. iii. 20, 21). And, while 
conversing with him under the guise of a friend, he drew out 
a dagger which he had concealed under his garments, and 
plunged it into his bod} T , and killed him. And the Lord, ww the 
God of Israel," is represented as raising up the bloody-minded 
Ehud for the special purpose of perpetrating this shocking deed 
of murder. To circulate a book among the heathen, detailing 
such revolting deeds of cruelty as consistent with sound morality, 
and approved by a just and righteous God, is an evil of no 
small magnitude. 

I will cite one other case illustrative of Bible intolerance. It 
is round in the history of the godly Phinehas, related in the 
twenty-fifth chapter of Numbers. lie was one of u The Lord's 
peculiar people," who were such violent sectarians that they 
showed no mercy towards any nation or any individual who 
dissented from their creed. Hence, when it was reported to 

Moses and his (lod that Zimri and his wife Cozbi had become 
converts to the Baal-peo? religion, they sent Phinehas after them 
with deadly weapons to slay them for heresy; and he chased 



THE BIBLE SANCTIONS CRIME. 281 

them into their tents, and slew them with a javelin upon their 
own hearthstone for no crime whatever against the moral 
law, but for simply exercising their God-given right to worship 
God according to the dictates of their consciences. It was a 
feeling of sectarianism, intolerance, and bitter animosity which 
prompted the act. We can not wonder, therefore, that Chris- 
tian Bible believers, who have chosen this book as " the supreme 
rule of their conduct," should have written their histoiy in 
blood, and that the whole pathway of their pilgrimage is strewn 
with the bones of their murdered victims, who were slain for 
being true to their consciences, and for believing in and wor- 
shiping God according to their convictions of right and duty. 

In addition to the long list of crimes alread}' enumerated as 
being sanctioned by the Bible, we will name a few others : — 

Lying. — We find that nearly all the leading characters who 
figure in Bible history, and who are* held up as moral exem 
plars of the human race, were guilty of tying either directly or 
indirect!}'. We will cite a few cases : — 

It is shown that Abraham and his wife (Gen. xx.) , and Isaac 
(Gen. xxvi.), and Jacob (Gen. xxxi.), were all guilty of false- 
hood ; also Rachel, Jacob's wife (Gen. xxxi.), Jacob's sons 
(Gen. xxxvii.), and Samson (Judg. xvi.), and Elisha (2 
Kings), and four hundred prophets (1 Kings xxii.). And 
Jeremiah makes out all the prophets were virtual liars (Jer. 
vi. 13). Peter lied three times in about seventy-five minutes 
(Luke xxii.). And Paul justifies lying (Rom. iii-7). With 
so man}- examples of tying Iry " inspired and holy men of old," 
the custom became popular among the early Christians, and was 
upheld and justified by them, as stated by the popular Christian 
writer, Mosheim. And some of " the heathen nations," for 
this reason, were accustomed to calling the Jews " the sons 
of falsehood." Xow, we appeal to the moral consciousness of 
every honest reader to decide in. his own mind whether it is 
possible for a book containing such defective moral inculcations 
to be calculated to promote true virtue, or a love of truth, in 
either Christian or heathen nations, and whether it should not, 
on this account, be kept out of the hands of the heathen, as 
being calculated to weaken their natural appreciation of truth. 



282 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Sicearing. — Let the reader turn to his Bible concordance, and 
observe the hundreds of cases in which God and his people are 
represented as swearing. He can then understand why pro- 
fanity is now more prevalent in Christian than in heathen coun- 
tries. God himself is several times represented as swearing in 
his wrath (Ps. xcv. 11). It should therefore be expected to be 
prevalent amongst Christian Bible believers. 

As a Christian missionary was recently returning from India 
on board a British vessel, observing a Christian professor fre- 
quently swearing, he stepped to him, and observed, " Here, sir, 
is nry son, twent3 r -one years old, born and raised in a heathen 
land, and to-da}^ is the first time he ever heard a profane oath." 
Rather n withering lesson for a Christian professor. There are 
obviously two causes for the great prevalency of profane & v ear- 
ing in all Christian countries. One is its frequent indor emeiit 
in the Bible, and the other is the common custom of the priest- 
hood apparently indulging in the practice in the pulpit. In 
their godly zeal to convert sinners, they exclaim, " God will 
damn you." The boys in the congregation catch the refrain, 
run into the street, and repeat the oath (dropping one word), 
" God damn you." Before we can expect this foolish and 
demoralizing practice to be abandoned, we must have a different 
Bible and different religious teachers ; and also before we can 
prevent the heathen who read our Bible from imitating our 
example in swearing, or using profane language. 

Cursing. — The numerous cases of cursing recorded in the 
Bible from Jehovah to Elisha, who cursed the sportive, 
boys, and then destroyed them with bears, are calculated to en- 
gender and foster the worst and most malignant passions of 
the human mind. The very name of the Jews' God, Jehovah 
(Elphim), is derived from a root which signifies "to curse and 
to swear." And the immoral practice of cursing is continued 
from the Old Testament through the New. 

Murder. — We have spoken of murders perpetrated by the 
Jews under the authority of a theocratic government. We will 
now cite some eases of a more private character: Cain, the 
lirM man horn into the world, was a murderer; and, instead 
of being punished for it, he appears to have been honored. He 



THE BIBLE SANCTIONS CRIME. 283 

went into the land of Nod, and built a great city. " The man 
after God's own heart" (David) indirectly killed Uriah; Ju- 
dith cut off the head of Holofernes while in bed with him, — a 
most shocking case ; Jehoiada, the priest, murdered his queen 
at the high gate in cold blood ; Jael, the wife of Heber, mur- 
dered the flying fugitive Sisera by driving a nail though his 
head ; Ehud murdered the King of Eglon under the guise of 
friendship ; Absalom murdered Ammon ; Joab murdered Absa- 
lom ; Solomon murdered his brother Adonijah ; Baasha mur- 
dered Nadab ; Zimri murdered Elah ; Omri murdered Zirnri ; 
Ahab murdered Naboth ; Jehu murdered Ahab and Joram ; 
Shall um murdered Zachariah ; Hoshea murdered Pekah. Nu- 
merous other cases might be cited. Some of these murderers 
were leading men among the Jews, — men whose life and char- 
acter exercised great influence ; and consequently such examples 
were very pernicious, and the moral lesson they impart to Bible 
readers must be corrupting to their moral feelings, if not their 
moral conduct. 

Flogging. — The practice of flogging is regarded as a relic of 
barbarism by all modern writers on moral ethics. We find it was 
prescribed by law under the Hebrew monarchy. Forty lashes, 
in some cases, while the victim was tied or held down, was 
the penalty for certain crimes. (See Deut. xxv.) If they were 
schooled in the councils of infinite wisdom as they claimed to 
be, their God should have taught them a less severe and more 
enlightened method of treating offenders. 

Witchcraft. — "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live " (Exod. 
xxii. 18) has been the watchword and the authority for the 
slaughter of great numbers of human beings. Figures can not 
compute the tortures, the shocking cruelties, and the heart- 
crushing sufferings which have been endured as the legitimate 
fruit of this superstitious, barbarous law of " God's holy 
people." It was continued in force to a late period, and has 
been more extensively practiced by Christians than b} T Jews. 
The number of victims in Christian England alone amounts to 
hundreds of thousands. A large portion of them were tied hand 
and foot, and thrown into the w^ater. If they sank; that termin- 
ated the case, guilty or not guilty ; if they swam or floated, that 



284 TUE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

was regarded as an evidence of guilt, and they were taken out, 
and burned or hanged. During its reign in England, thirty 
thousand harmless women were burned as witches, mostly poor 
women who had no means of self-defense. 

Even the learned Sir Matthew Hale, one of England's most 
enlightened Christian jurists, sentenced a number of poor women 
to be hanged in 1664 as witches ; and the reason he assigned 
for it was, that " the Bible leaves no doubt as to the realuy of 
witchcraft, and the duty of putting its subjects to death." 
Thus we have an illustration of the enormous evils which have 
grown out of Bible superstitions, perpetuated b} T those who were 
so ignorant as to accept the book as authority. Witchcraft, 
which was believed by Bible writers and Bible Christians to be 
the work of the Devil or of evil spirits, is now well understood 
in the light of modern science as to its causes, of which Bible 
revelation was ignorant. 

As the want of space will permit no further exposition or 
enumeration of Bible crimes, we will sum up the whole thus : 
Murder, theft, robbery, war, slavery, intemperance, polygamy, 
concubinage, fornication, rape, piracy, lying, assassination, 
treachery, tyranny, revenge, persecution for religious opinions, 
vagabondism, degradation and enslavement of women, hypoc- 
risy, breach of faith, suicide, vulgarity or obscenit}', witchcraft, 
flogging, cursing, swearing, &c. 

We have cited texts and examples in proof of the statement 
that all these crimes, and others not here enumerated, are sanc- 
tioned by God's w> holy word," and were perpetrated by God's 
u holy people," as they are called. And yet a Christian writer 
declares, "The Lord kept his people pure, holy, and upright 
through every period of their history. " A statement could 
hardly be made thai would be farther from the truth. It Is 
another evidence of the blinding effect of a false religion. 

Again we ask, should a book, lending its sanction to the long 

catalogue Of Crimes herein enumerated, and which represents 

them as being in accordance with the will of a holy and a right- 
eous God, be placed in the hands of the illiterate and credulous 
heathen as a guide for their moral conduct? Most certainly it 
must have a deleterious effect upon their morals; and yet linn- 



IMMORAL INFLUENCE OF THE BIBLE. 285 

clreds of thousands are distributed amongst them every year by 
the Christian churches and missionary societies. And then 
think of making such a book " the fountain of our laws, and 
the supreme rule of our conduct," as urged by the Evangelical 
Alliance and the orthodox churches. We almost tremble at the 
thought of such a step toward barbarism and demoralization. 



CHAPTER XLVIII. 

IMMORAL INFLUENCE OF THE BIBLE. 

With the characteristic moral teaching of the Christian Bible, 
presented in the preceding chapter and throughout i±ds work, 
we see not how to escape the conviction that the Bible has 
inflicted, and must necessarily inflict, a demoralizing influence 
on society wherever it is read and believed. It is morally im- 
possible for any person to read and believe a book sanction- 
ing, or appearing to sanction, so many species of crime and 
immorality without sustaining more or less moral and mental 
injury by it. For whatever views he may entertain with respect 
to the numerous crimes therein reported as having been com- 
mitted with the approval, and often at the command, of a just 
God, it must naturally and inevitably have the tendency to 
weaken his detestation of those crimes, and also weaken his 
zeal and effort to extinguish them and other similar crimes now 
existing in society. It must also lower his conception of the 
moral attributes of Deity. However honest, and however natu- 
rally opposed to such immoralities at the outset, it is impossible 
for him to entertain the belief that they were once approved, or 
even connived at, by a morally perfect being, without becoming 
unconsciously weakened in his feelings of opposition to, and his 
hatred of, such deeds. It may be alleged that these practices 
are at war with those precepts which enjoin us to do unto others 
as we would have them do unto us ; and that of loving our 
neighbors as ourselves, &c. This is true ; but reason and expe- 
rience both teach us, as an important lesson in moral and mental 
philosophy, that, when a book which is accepted as a guide for 



286 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

the conduct and moral actions of men contains contradictory 
precepts, the people will seize on and reduce to practice those 
most consonant with their natures, and most congenial to their 
natural feelings and inclinations. Hence it can easily be seen, 
that as the animal feelings and propensities which lead to the 
commission of crime, when unduly exercised, have always been 
stronger with the masses or the populace than the moral feel- 
ings, the} T have consequently always been more disposed to yield 
a compliance with those precepts which sanction, or appear to 
sanction, the commission of crime, than those which are con- 
demnatoiy of crime. All persons in whose minds the animal 
propensities are the strongest will seize with eagerness the 
least authorit} T , or appearance of authority, for committing those 
crimes which they are naturally inclined to commit, and for 
which they are glad to find a license or encouragement to com- 
mit. Under such circumstances they will ignore the virtuous 
precepts, and yield a compliance with those of an opposite char- 
acter. Therefore Christian professors who expect the Bible to 
exert a moral influence in reforming the world and freeing it 
from crime, because it contains some beautiful and sound moral 
precepts, will be disappointed; for those precepts will be neu- 
tralized, and their effects destroyed, by those of an opposite char- 
acter. A majorit3 T of the people in all countries have always 
possessed a strong inclination for committing those crimes 
which, we have shown, the Christian Bible appears to sanction. 
Hence the Bible, with all its counteracting precepts, will only 
add fuel to the fire, for the reason already pointed out. Those 
who do not know this must be ignorant of the most important 
principles of moral science, and the elements of human nature 
Right here is where Christians commit a serious mistake. They 
itter their Bibles among the heathen by the thousand, a^stim- 
ing thai it will have the effect to moralize and civilize them, 
while they can find a warrant in it (as shown in the preceding 

chapter) for every species of crime they have been in the habit 
of committing. This is a solemn error they have been commit- 
ting forages. Hence their missionary labors, instead of reform- 
ing the heathen, have only tended to demoralize them, where 
they have not been counteracted by the more rational religion 



THE BIBLE AT WAR WITH SCIENCES. 287 

of science and nature, as they have been in many cases. Many 
facts could be adduced to prove this statement, some of which 
may be found in Chapter 50. ( u Bible a Moral Necessity- "). 
Wherever the Bible has been introduced, without the arts and 
sciences to counteract its influence (as in Abyssinia and the 
Samoan Islands), crime has increased. History proves that 
wherever the Bible has been circulated without any counter- 
acting influences, both in Christian and heathen nations, it has 
had the effect to weaken the moral strength of the people, lower 
their natural appreciation of virtue and a true moral life, and 
has had a tendency to popularize crime by making it more 
respectable. It is therefore an unsuitable book to circulate as 
a guide for the moral conduct of man in any country. 



CHAPTER XLIX. 

THE BIBLE AT WAR WITH EIGHTEEN SCIENCES. 

The word " science" is from the Latin scire ("to know"). 
Hence every statement incompatible with the teachings and 
principles of science is simply ignorance arrayed against knowl- 
edge. It may surprise some who have been taught that the 
Bible contains u a perfect embodiment of truth," or who be- 
lieve, with the redoubtable Dr. Cheever, that "the Bible does 
not contain the shadow of a shade of error from Genesis to 
Revelations," — it will doubtless surprise all such persons to be 
told, that, so far from Dr. Cheever' s statement being correct, 
" the Holy Book," by a fair estimate, is found to contain more 
than nine thousand scientific errors alone; i.e., more than 
nine thousand statements and assumptions which conflict with 
thel^established principles of modern science Abesides errors in 
morals, history, &c. It is believed there is not one chapter in 
the book which does not contain several errors of this charac- 
ter. This, perhaps, should not be a matter of surprise to any 
person after viewing the character and condition of philosoplry 
and the wide-spread scientific ignorance which reigned over the 
world at that period. Let it be borne in mind that science was 



288 TIIE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

but just budding into life, and philosophy had attained but a 
feeble growth amongst that portion of the earth's inhabitants 
who constituted the representatives of the Jewish and Christian 
religion. Not only does their history and their writings show 
that they were, for the most part, ignorant of what little sci- 
ence there was in the world, — which was small compared with 
the present period, — but they opposed it wdienever they came 
in contact with it. Every thing w T as ascribed to supernatural 
power. The word " science " only occurs twice in the Bible, — 
once in the Old Testament, and once in the New ; and, in the 
latter case, it was used for the purpose of condemning it. Paul 
advises Timothy to "beware of the babblings of science" (1 
Tim. vi. 20). The word " philosoplry " is used but once in 
the Bible, and then not to recommend it ; but Paul uses it 
to condemn it, as he does science, or at least to discourage it : 
" Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and 
vain conceit' ■ (Col. ii. 8). It will be observed, then, that 
there is apparently a veto placed upon the study of science 
and philosophy in the only two instances in which reference 
is made to them in the Bible. We can not wonder, there- 
fore, that its devout disciples have in all ages, until a very 
recent period, set themselves squarely against the propagation 
of science and philosophy. It was but carrying out the spirit 
of their Bible. The early Christians, almost to a man, dis- 
couraged the study of science, and condemned and persecuted 
those who attempted to propagate its principles, and even put 
some of them to death. Copernicus was persecuted for setting 
forth principles of astronomy which conflicted with the teach- 
ings of the Bible; Galileo was sentenced to death because he 
taught the rotundity and revolution of the earth in opposition 
to the Bible, which declares, "The earth has foundations, and 
can not be removed" (Ps. civ. 5); and Bruno suffered the 
penalty of death for teaching substantially the same doctrine. 
And every discoverer in science was condemned and persecuted. 
Much was written by the early fathers in acknowledgment 
the incompatibility of science with religion and the teachii 
Of the Bible, and to warn the pious disciple of the dan 
of oeceapying his mind in the investigation and study of 



THE BIBLE AT WAU WITH SCIENCE. 289 

ence. Even Eusebius, the popular ecclesiastical writer of the 
third century, and one of the most intelligent Christians of that 
age, acknowledged he had a contempt for "the useless baubles 
of the philosophers : " "We think little of these matters, turning 
our souls to the exercise of better things." And Lactantius, a 
Christian of the same century, pronounced the study of plrysical 
causes of natural things " empty and false." And St. Augus- 
tine, u a shining light of the Church," treated with contempt 
the notion that the earth is round, as " trees on the other 
side would hang with their tops down, and the men there 
would have their feet higher than their heads." He condemns 
it as false, ;c because no such race is recorded in Scripture 
among the descendants of Adam." What profound reasoning ! 
Martin Luther utters his malediction against astronomy in the 
following language : " This false Copernicus will turn the whole 
art of astronom}^ upside down ; but the Scripture teacheth 
another lesson, when Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, 
and not the earth." Of course Joshua's order for the sun 
to stop knocks the science of astronomy on the head, and 
extinguishes it for ever with all true Bible believers ; and men 
have had to outgrow their Bibles before they could accept the 
teachings of astronomy. When we take into consideration 
the almost boundless acquisitions that have been made in the 
field of science since the invention of the printing art, and 
the many discoveries evolved in every department of science 
and art, now classified into a long list of new sciences, and 
which throw a flood of light on almost every thing taught by 
the ancients in morals, religion, or science, we should not be 
surprised to find more or less error in every thing they taught. 
Let us look for a moment at the long list of sciences now 
taught in our schools, most of which were unknown two hun- 
dred years ago : Astronomy, geology, chemistry, mineral- 
ogy, meteorology, pneumatics, hydrostatics, mechanics, psy- 
chology, paleontolog}% anthropolog}', ethnology, archseolog}^ 
biology, histoiy, chronology, botany, zoology, philosophy, 
physiology, ornitholog}', geograplxy, mathematics, optics, acous- 
tics, phrenology, animal magnetism, &c. The facts and prin- 
ciples now comprised in these several branches of science have 



290 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

mostly been developed within a comparatively recent period 
of time ; and almost every department of science here enu- 
merated embraces facts and discoveries which reveal important 
errors in the religious creeds of the ancient representatives of 
the Christian faith. To illustrate this statement, we will cite 
some examples : — 

1. Astronomy. — More than forty errors in astrononry will be 
found exposed in Chapter 15, treating on the Mosaic account 
of creation ; and here may be added a few more to the num- 
ber. Several texts in the Bible speak of the stars falling to the 
earth, or traveling in some lawless direction. Even Christ 
committed this error. (See Mark xiii. 25.) How ridiculous 
is this conception when viewed in connection with the fact that 
these stars are many of them larger than the ea: th ! Saturn 
is about a thousand times larger, and Jupiter twelve hundred 
times larger, than our planet. John speaks of one-third of the 
stars falling at once (Rev. xii. 4) . If these two large planets 
(Jupiter and Saturn) should be of the number, our little earth 
would fare rather badly, though it is evident they could not all 
have room to strike it. If they should strike it from opposite 
sides, they would effectually grind it to powder. The inspired 
writers of the Bible seem to have had their minds so filled with 
heavenly things, that there was but little room left for scientific 
knowledge appertaining to the earth. The idea of the sun 
being made ^ to rule by day, and the moon and stars to rule by 
night," as taught in Gen. i. 16, discloses still further the igno- 
rance of Bible writers on astronomy. 

2. Geological Errors. — The story of the creation in Genesis 
(as exposed in Chapter 1 5 of this work) contains many geo- 
logical errors. Almost every statement, in fact, conflicts with 
the teachings of geology, and especially the assumption that 
the earth, with the retinue of worlds which roll through infinite 
Bpace, was brought into existence by a fiat of Omnipotence, and 
only about six thousand years ago ; while many facts in geological 
science disprove its creation, and prove that it existed hundreds 

oi* thousands, if not millions, of years ago. For the numer< 
Bible errors under this head, see Chapter 15. 

;;. I r rr<ws in Geography. — The language applied to the earth 



THE BIBLE AT WAR WITH SCIENCE. 291 

by various writers of the Bible show quite plainly that they 
entertained very erroneous conceptions of its form and size, 
and the laws that govern it. Such language as "the founda- 
tions of the earth " (Ps. civ. 5 ; Job xxxviii. 4), u the ends of 
earth," u the corners of the earth," "the pillars of the 
earth" (1 Sam. ii. 8), clearly indicate that Bible writers enter- 
tained the common, erroneous conceptions of that age, that the 
earth is a flat, square, angular figure, only inhabited on one 
side. Matthew, who represents Christ as seeing all the king- 
doms of the earth from the top of a mountain, plainly discloses 
the same error. 

4. Errors in Ethnology. — The Bible assumption of the ori- 
gin of man within a period of six thousand years, and Ihe 
descent of the whole race from a single pair, is directly at vari- 
ance with the teachings of ethnological science, which discloses 
the true history of man, and proves, according to Agassiz and 
other modern naturalists, that the human race has descended 
from at least five pairs of original progenitors. See a work 
entitled u T} T pes of Mankind," compiled from the writings 
of the ablest naturalists of the age. 

5. Archceology , which treats of antiquity, presents us with 
nearly the same series of scientific facts to disprove the Bible 
histoiy of man. It presents us with many facts in the history 
of the ancient empires of India, Egypt, Greece, China, and 
Persia, which directly contradict many statements found in the 
Christian Bible, which the want of space compels us to omit any 
notice of here. (See chapters on Bibles.) 

6. Biology. — The Bible statements which make a son two 
years older than his father (2 Chron. xxi. and xxii.), a girl only 
three }'ears old when she married, and two millions of people 
spring from seventy persons in two hundred and fifteen years, 
are all at variance with the teachings of biology. 

7. Botany. — The origin of thorns and thistles, and the pre- 
servation of the whole vegetable kingdom during Noah's flood, 
as inferential^ taught by the Christian Bible, conflict with the 
present established principles of botany. 

8. Zoology. — This science, which discloses the true history 
of animal life, completely disproves some statements of the 



292 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Bible relative to the animal kingdom. The hare is pronounced 
unclean in Leviticus, " because he cheweth the cud, but divideth 
not the hoof" (Lev. xi. 6). Here are three incorrect state- 
ments. The hare does not chew the cud, and does divide the 
hoof, and is not unclean (i.e;, not unsuitable for food). 

9. Ornithology . — The writer who represents God as shower- 
ing down nine hundred square miles of quails, three feet thick, 
around the Jewish camp to serve as food (see Numb. xi. 32), 
must have been ignorant of the size of this bird, if not of the 
whole feathered tribe. 

10. Physiology. — The apostle James must have been igno- 
rant of the science of plrysiology when he declares the prayers 
of the elders of the Church would heal the sick (Jas. v. 15). 
It is not denied but that the presence of the elders could 
exercise a healing influence on the sick ; but it should be 
ascribed to their magnetism, and not to their prayers. The 
numerous cases in which disease is represented by Christ and 
his disciples as being produced by devils or evil spirits, and a 
cure effected b}^ ejecting the diabolical intruder, shows them to 
have been ignorant of plrysiology ; as does also the story of the 
sons of God cohabiting with the daughters of men (Gen. vi. 4), 
and producing a race of giants which, according to the Book 
of Enoch, were three hundred cubits high. Rather tall speci- 
mens of humanity. Their heads would be above the clouds, so 
that they could not see which wa} T they were traveling. This 
story finds a parallel in the 4 traditions of India, which once pro- 
duced a race of giants so tall that they could neither sit down 
in the house, nor stand up out of doors. Their eyes were so 
fox from the ground that they could not see their feet. All 
these stories originated in an age which was destitute of a 
knowledge of physiology; and, as this amalgamation of Gods 

with human beings did nothing to improve the race, the story is 
lit utc of a moral, and proves (if it proves any thing) that 
I rod i were no better than men. 

11. Mental Science, — The two hundred texts which repre- 
sent the heart as being the scat of the mind or soul furnish 
Conclusive evidence that the writers were ignorant of the Qrst 
principles of mental science. ** My heart uttereth understand- 



THE BIBLE AT WAR WITH SCIENCE. 293 

ing," and u a pure heart," are examples. "An upright 
liver," or u a pure liver," would be just as sensible language. 
There is not one text in the book that implies a knowledge 
of the brain as being the organ of the mind, which is a scien- 
tific fact now well established. 

12. Animal Magnetism. — The exposition of this science by 
Mesmer, Deluse, Townsend, and other writers, renders it clearly 
evident that the phenomena of witchcraft, trance, and many 
cases of spiritual vision, were nothing more nor less than the 
products of animal magnetism superinduced by the action of 
mind on mind, or the control of the mind by magnetic sub- 
stances, — the science of magnetism being entirely unknown in 
that era of the world. Every case reported of restoring life to 
a dead person by Christ, Elijah, Elisha, and other God-men, 
if they had any foundation in truth, are explained by the prin- 
ciples of this science. Similar cases have been witnessed in 
modern times. 

13. Philosophy. — The science of philosophy, in its matured 
aspect, is of modern origin, and furnishes the true explana- 
tion for many of the " mysteries of godliness," and other 
mysteries of the Christian Bible, which, by the illiterate 
writers of that age, were ascribed to the direct manifestation 
of deific powers. They are now known to be natural occur- 
rences, instead of supernatural, as assumed by the writers. The 
Bible stoiy of the rainbow furnishes one example. Moses 
must have been ignorant of philosophy when he selected the 
rainbow as an evidence there should be no rain in the future in 
sufficient quantities to inundate the earth again, when it is 
known that the rainbow is a certain evidence of rain, as it is 
produced by the rain in the act of falling. This is but one 
of man}' errors which the ignorant, illiterate Bible writers 
have made for want of knowledge on scientific subjects, such 
as the histoiy of creation, the story of the flood, &c. The 
several cases in which thunder is spoken of as being the voice 
of God disclose great ignorance of philosophy ; and several 
instances in which God promises to take away the sickness 
of the people evince an entire ignorance of the natural laws 
which control health and disease. (See Exod. xxiii. 25 ; Deut. 
vii. 15.) 



294 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

14. 3Iathematics. — The Bible is deficient in many cases with 
respect to the correct observance of the rules and principles 
of mathematics. Its assumption that there can be but one 
God, and at the same time acknowledging three, furnishes a 
striking proof of this. Its enumeration of the families and 
tribes furnishes another evidence of this. Its calculation of 
numbers rarely coincides with the names. For example : Luke, 
in his gospel, states there are forty-two generations from David 
to Joseph ; but his list of names only makes forty-one. And 
Matthew says, Ci From Adam to David are fourteen generations ; 
but, by counting his list of names, we find but thirteen. The 
date of Methuselah's birth and his age, when compared to- 
gether, extend his age ten months beyond the inauguration 
of the flood. How he sustained life, and avoided drowning 
during that time, must be one of the u nrysteries of godliness." 
These are a few specimens of Bible mathematics. 

15. Chemistry. — A specimen of Bible chemistry is found in 
the story of " fire and brimstone descending from heaven to- 
gether" without a coalescence, or the chemical combination 
and product which usually result from a contact of these two 
elements. Another specimen is presented in the process of 
manufacturing a golden calf by merely casting gold ear-rings, 
finger-rings, &c, into the fire; and also Moses' invention for 
grinding the same gold into powder, and sprinkling it on the 
water, and compelling the people to drink it. No process is 
known in modern times by which gold can be ground to powder, 
nor Cor holding it in solution if ground and thrown into water. 
The specific gravity of all gold now in use causes it to sink 
to the bottom as soon as it is thrown into water. Bible chem- 
istry seems to differ from natural chemistry. 

16. Pneumatics, — Had Jehorah been acquainted with this 
. h" could not have become alarmed about having his 

kingdom invaded by the builders of Babel; for we learn, by 

an acquaintance with the principles of this science, that the air 

> rarefied as we ascend, that we BOOH reach ;i point 

where human life must cease. Hence it was unnecessary to 

confound the language <>f the people in order to arrest the com- 
pletion <'f the tower. They would have been compelled to 
desist before they laid got many miles from the earth. 



THE BIBLE AT WAR WITH SCIENCE. 295 

17. Acoustics'. — Moses must have been ignorant of this sci- 
ence, or presumed his readers would be, when he related the 
numerous cases of himself and Joshua and others reading and 
talking to two millions of people, some of whom must have been 
several miles distant. No human voice in modern times could 
reach one-half of such an audience. 

18. Hydrostatics. — This science teaches us that several cases 
reported in the Bible of the waters of rivers and seas being 
separated and erected in perpendicular columns so as to form 
embankments, are contradicted bj^ all the laws governing fluids, 
and hence are wholly incredible. The sciences of optics, mete- 
orology, philology, and psychology might also be included in 
the above list as being ignored and practically set aside by Bible 
writers. And } T et, in the face of all these facts, Dr. Cheever 
says, " There is a beautiful harmony between the principles 
of science and the teachings of the Bible throughout the whole 
book." And this seems to have been the universal conviction 
of the disciples of the Christian faith before the progress of 
scientific discovery in modern times laid bare the errors of the 
Holy Book. Since that juncture in biblical theology culminated, 
a new^ theory has been set on foot to dispose of the scientific 
errors of the Bible. Yfe are told, as an apology for these 
errors, that "the Bible was designed to teach religion and 
morality, and not science." This is too true ; but a true system 
of religion must be based on the principles of science. The plea 
also discloses a scientific ignorance on the part of the objector 
in not knowing Ci there is science in every thing." Hence it is 
impossible to write on any subject without coming in contact 
with the principles of science, which you must either conform 
to or violate. Persons destitute of scientific knowledge, as were 
Bible writers, are liable, in their ignorance, to stumble into 
scientific errors in writing on any subject. 



296 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES, 



CHAPTER L. 

THE BIBLE AS A MORAL NECESSITY. 

The question is frequently asked by Bible adherents, What 
would be the moral condition of society without the Bible? 
Would it not again relapse into barbarism? Such questions 
manifest an ignorance of historj- and the moral instincts of the 
human mind, and are easily met and answered by other ques- 
tions indicating broader views. We ask, then, what was the 
moral condition of the world, or that portion of it included 
in the Jewish nation, during the two thousand }~ears which 
elapsed before airy part of our Bible was written? Was 
it ain' worse than the next two thousand years after it 
was written? And what is the moral condition of five- 
sixths of the human famity now, who never had our Bible? 
Facts in history prove that the morals of some of the na- 
tions included in this class are superior to that of any Bible 
nation, either now existing, or figuring in past history. Take, 
for example, the Japanese. We will present the testimony 
of an English officer, Col. Hall. Reporting his own observa- 
tions and experience, he says, " During more than a year's 
Idence in Japan, I never saw a quarrel among young or old. 
I have never seen an angry blow struck, and have scarcely 
heard an angry word. I have seen the children at their sports, 
flying their kites on the hill ; and no amount of entangled strings. 

or kites lodged in the trees, provoked angry words or impa- 
tience. In their games of jackstones and marbles, I have 

never seen an approach to a quarrel among them. They are 
taughl implicit obedience to their parents ; but I have never 

11 <>!ic of them chastised. Respect and reverence for the 

1 i- universal. A crying child is seldom seen. We have 

nothing to teach them out of the abundance of our civilization." 



THE BIBLE AS A MORAL NECESSITY. 297 

And a description of this nation by Dr. Oliphant fully confirms 
the above. He says, " Universal testimony assures us, that, in 
their domestic relations, the men are gentle and forbearing ; the 
women, obedient and virtuous. Every department of crime 
is less in proportion to the population than in Christian coun- 
tries. The native tribunals prove their competency to deal 
with criminals by giving general satisfaction. Unlike airy 
Christian country, locks and keys are never used ; yet theft and 
robbery are almost unknown. Although we had the most 
tempting curiosities with us, and left them laying about our 
lodgings for months ^ not one of them was carried off, though 
our room was sometimes crowded with people. During the 
whole of our stay in Yeddo, we never heard a scolding woman, 
nor saw a disturbance in the streets, nor a child struck or oth- 
erwise maltreated. In case of disputes between neighbors, 
their children are often selected as arbiters, and always give 
satisfaction. And parents in their old age often give their 
property and the entire management of their affairs into the 
hands of their children, who never betray their trust." Xow, 
it must be evident to every reader, that no such a moral picture 
of society can be presented of any Christian country. And 
yet the Christian Bible is not only scarcely known among them, 
but they have resisted the most determined efforts of the Chris- 
tian missionaries, for more than two hundred years, to introduce 
it and circulate it amongst them, and have kept it out b} r posi- 
tive prohibition most of the time. Do such facts tend to 
confirm the statement often made by devout Chrisitans, that 
u the Bible must be introduced and read by the people before 
they can have good morals in an}' country' ' ? As a still further 
proof of the erroneousness of this statement, we will now con- 
trast the state of morals in the most religious Christian coun- 
tries with that of the heathen nation just referred to. And this 
moral picture of our country is from the. pen of a Christian 
writer, the celebrated Parson Brownlow. He tells us, "The 
gospel is preached to the people regularly all over the country. 
. . . And yet, notwithstanding ail this, rascality abounds in 
all classes of society. . . . Cheating and misrepresentation are 
the order of the da}'. In politics there is very little patriotism 



298 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

or love of country. In religion there is more hypocrisy than 
grace ; and the biggest scoundrels living, crowd the church with 
a view to hide their rascally designs, and more effectually serve 
the Devil. Pious villains, as sanctified as the moral law, are 
keeping false accounts, and resort to them for the sake of gain. 
... In a word, rascality abounds among all classes.' ' Now 
look on this picture, and then on that. We will now present 
another contrast. TTe will look at another specimen of morality 
among the heathen. The portraiture is furnished us by the 
celebrated Christian missionary, Dr. Livingstone. Speaking of 
some of the African tribes he encountered in his travels, he says, 
" The inhabitants have man}' wise laws and politic institutions, 
which would not discredit any nation in Europe. They are not 
a warlike people, but appear to hold martial achievements in great 
contempt or abhorrence. They have such a nice sense of justice 
and equity, that the}' will by no means make any encroach- 
ments on the territory of their neighbors. Their dealings with 
each other are characterized by mutual confidence, which Chris- 
tians would do well to imitate." No man is afraid of bei 
cheated. No precautions are used to prevent theft and rob- 
bery ; and yet no theft and robbery are committed. Their goods 
to be sold are stored in an open bazaar, left without any attend- 
ants, and the purchaser fixes his own price, and leaves what he 
considers a fair equivalent in its stead ; and all parties are sat- 
isfied. It would seem, then, that, while in Christian countries 
•• it requires two to make a bargain," in heathen countries it 
lequires but one. Here. then, we have the morals of a heathen 
nation, who not only knew nothing of Christianity, but would not 
condescend to talk with the missionary on the subject, but put 

him off with the plea. "It makes no difference what a man's 
religion is. if his morals and practical life are right." Sensible 
isoning. We will now turn another leaf in Christian history 
with the inquiry, Is every country honored with the name 
of Christian distinguished for morality, and every nation stig- 
matized .-i- heathen pract ieallv immoral? 3ent 
another specimen of Christian morality from the pen of that 
popular ( Ihristian writer. Mr. ( roodrich. Speaking of the moral 

Condition Of one of the oldest Christian nations now existing 



THE BIBLE AS A MOBAL NECESSITY. 299 

(the Abyssinians), he says, "They are restless, savage, and 
brutal, almost beyond any known tribes of men. The Scotch 
traveler, Mr. Bruce, was at Gondar, the capital ; and he tells us 
that he seldom went out without seeing dead human bodies 
lying in the streets, left to be devoured by the dogs and hyenas. 
Alnarv, who lived there some years since, says he was invited 
to a feast, where, amongst the dishes he was offered, was flesh 
with warm blood. TV r e are told the people eat the flesh from 
the cattle while alive ; and sometimes, after a large piece has 
been cut out, the skin is drawn over it, and the bleeding beast 
driven on its way. Sometimes, when a party is assembled for 
a feast, and are seated, the oxen are brought to the door, the 
flesh is cut off the living animal, and the meat devoured while 
the agonized brutes are filling the air with their bello wings. ... 
And the manners of the people in other respects are horrible in 
the extreme. Yet, strange to say, they profess Christianity, 
and have numerous churches. Their saints are almost innu- 
merable, and surpass in miraculous power those of the Eomish 
Church. The clergy do not attempt to prevent divorces, nor 
even polygamy." In confirmation of the above graphic picture, 
we will quote also from an English geography by Guthrie and Fer- 
guson, F.R.S. (p. 923) : u The inhabitants of Abyssinia consist 
of Christians. Some ecclesiastical writers would persuade us 
that the conversion of Abyssinia to Christianhy happened in the 
time of the apostles ; but others state that this was after, — in 
the year 333. There is no such thing as marriage in Abyssinia, 
and no distinction made between legitimate and illegitimate 
children, from the king to the beggar." Here, then, is u Chris- 
tian" morality, and here is a specimen of Christian "free-lov- 
ism" too, in a country where the Christian Bible has been 
circulated by the thousand, and read and adored for at least 
ffteen hundred years. Such facts furnish a complete refutation 
of the popular Christian assumption that ' ' true and pure 
morality is inseparable from Christianity and the Bible." 
The truth is, the Bible alone has never done any thing to advance 
the cause of either morality or civilization in any country, 
because it is interdicted from improvement. It ma} T be asked 
here, Why is it, then, that both religion and morality prosper 



300 TUE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

in most countries whore the Bible has been introduced? The 
answer to this question is found in the important fact, overlooked 
by the Christian world, that the arts and sciences generally 
accompany, or soon follow, the introduction of the Bible ; but, 
where this has not been the case, and the Bible has been circu- 
lated alone, as in the case of Ab3^ssinia, no progress ichatever 
has been made towards the establishment of true morality or a 
rational religion, or an} r of the adjuncts of civilization, thus 
proving that the causes for the moral growth and improvement 
of societ}^ are outside of, and independent of, the Bible, and, 
we will add (in view of the man} T immoral lessons taught in 
the book), in spite of the Bible. A little rational reflection 
must convince any unbiased person that Bibles, in the very 
nature of things, must retard the moral and intellectual ad- 
vancement and prosperity of society in eveiy respect, not- 
withstanding the}' contain many good and beautiful precepts, 
for representing, as they do, the imperfect state of morals in 
the age and country in which they were written ; while their 
teachings are assumed to be a finalit}^ in moral and religious 
progress, and hence are not allowed to be transcended in pre- 
cept or practice. The consequence is, society would be pinned 
down immovably and perpetually to the same barbarous religion 
and morals of that age, if it were not pushed forward by the 
irresistible influences of the arts and sciences. Hence we owe 
our advancement and prosperity not to Bibles, but to causes 
(t(h-</K<i'e t<) counteract and overcome their adverse influences. 

The Moral Benefits of Infidelity. 

An additional argument to prove the Bible is not a moral 

necessity to teach the practical duties of life is the tact that that 

class of persons known as "infidels," who entirely reject the 

book .'i- a guide or as a moral instructor on account of its very 

defective and contradictory system of morals, are admitted by 
Leading orthodox journals and representative men in the nation 
to p088eS8 better moral characters and habits, and to lead better 

moral lives, than Bible believers. As a proof of this statement, 

we will here present the most woiwlei fill and humiliating conces- 
sions of that leading religious journal of the nation, "The' 



THE BIBLE AS A MORAL NECESSITY. 301 

New- York Evangelist." On this subject it speaks thus : " To 
the shame of the Church it must be confessed that the foremost 
men in all our philanthropic movements, in the interpretation of 
the spirit of the age, in the practical application of genuine 
Christianity, in the reformation of abuses in high and in low 
places, in the vindication of the rights of man and in practi- 
cally redressing his wrongs, in the moral and intellectual regen- 
eration of the race, are the so-called infidels in our land. The 
Church has pusillanimous^ left not only the working oar, but the 
very reins of salutary reform, in the hands of men she denounces 
as inimical to Christianity, and who are doing with all their 
might, for humanity's sake, that which the Church ought to be 
doing for Christ's sake ; and if they succeed, as succeed they will, 
in abolishing slavery, banishing rum, restraining licentiousness, 
reforming abuses, and elevating the masses, then must the 
recoil upon Christianity be disastrous in the extreme. Woe! 
woe! woe to Christianity when infidels, hy force of nature or 
the tendencies of the age, get ahead of the Church in morals, 
and in the practical work of Christianity. In some instances 
they are already far in advance. In the vindication of truth, 
righteousness, and liberty, they are the pioneers beckoning 
to a sluggish Church to follow in the rear." To this we 
will add the testimony of another orthodox writer (the eminent 
Catherine Beecher) as to the superior practical morality of 
infidels as compared with that of Christians. She says, in her 
" Appeal to the People " (p. 319), "It has come to pass that 
the world has been improving in practical virtue, while the 
Church has been deteriorating. The writer, in her very exten- 
sive travels and intercourse with the religious world, has had 
unusual opportunity to notice how surely and how extensively 
this fact has been observed and acknowledged by the best class 
of clergymen and laymen." She says one of the most labori- 
ous Episcopal bishops of the Western States declares, that tw the 
world is growing better, and the Church is growing worse." 
She next cites the testimony of an eminent lawyer and church- 
member who is carrying on an extensive financial business 
throughout the country, and who makes the remarkable state- 
ment, that " the better class of worldly men are more honorable 



302 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

and reliable in business than the majority of church-members." 
(Let the reader mark this statement.) And this declaration 
was concurred in by another eminent lawyer, banker, and 
church-member, who is doing a more extensive business in the 
North- western States than any other man. And he states that 
the most extensive business-man in Central New York has 
arrived at the same conclusion as the result of his observation. 
And the greatest business-man in Boston is also referred to, 
whose experience led him to this conclusion. And other busi- 
ness-men in different parts of the country testify to the same 
effect. We may, then, set it down as the universal testimoiry of 
business-men that infidels and ''outsiders" are more honest, 
more reliable, more truthful, and more honorable than church- 
members. What a fatal argument these facts furnish against 
the religion and morality of the Christian Bible ! They indicate 
that the religion and morality of nature and science are supe- 
rior. 

Burning the World's Benefactors as Infidels. 

It will be perceived, from the preceding orthodox testimonies, 
that the class of people usually stigmatized as infidels are the 
true exemplars in practical morality, and the true benefactors 
of society. And Christian countries owe them a debt of grati- 
tude for all the reforms and improvements which have proved 
such signal blessings to society within the last few hundred 
years, and for their own elevation out of the groveling igno- 
rance of barbarism into the glorious sunlight of civilization. 
What withering self-reproach, what shameful mortification and 
self-condemnation, they ought therefore to feel in view of having 
committed so many of them to the flames, or otherwise mal- 
treated and killed them ! For, according to the above Christian 
testimonies, they were the world's real benefactors ; and the fol- 
lowing Lisl will show that those victims perished at the hands 
of Christians as infidel martyrs: In 1511 Herman of Ryswick 
was burned for heresy; In 1546 Aonius Polearius was hung, 
and then burned for skepticism; in L574 Geofroi Vallie was 
burned for publishing a heretical hook; in 1546 Stephen Dolet, 
a printer and bookseller, was burned at Paris for atheism ; in 



SEND NO MOBE BIBLES TO THE HEATHEN. 303 

1579 Matthew Hamont had his ears cut off, and was then 
burned alive, in England, for denying that Christ is God ; in 
1583 John Lewes was burned at Norwich, Eng., for "denying 
the Godhead of Christ ; " in 1589 Francis Kett, a member of a 
college in Cambridge, Eng., was burned for holding "divers 
detestable opinions against Christ, our Savior; " in 1611 Bar- 
tholomew Legate was burned to ashes at Smithfield for deny- 
ing that Christ was God; in 1644 Edward Wight-man was 
burned at Litchfield for denying the divinity of Christ ; in 
1619 Lucilio Yanini, an Italian, was burned for atheistical opin- 
ions ; in 1574 John Gonganelle was poisoned for his infidelity 
by the Holy Sacrament ; in 1629 Alexander Leighton had his 
nose slit and his ears cut off, and was imprisoned for eleven 
years for publishing a work against miracles. To make the 
matter short, without extending the list, it has been estimated 
that forty thousand perished at the hands of Christians in forty 
years for infidelity, heresy, or other opinions deemed unsound 
by orthodox. And thus it will be perceived that infidelity has 
had its martyrs as well as Christianity ; and that Christians, in 
putting these men to death, were robbing the world (according 
to " The New- York Evangelist ") of its real benefactors. Oh, 
shame ! Christianity, where is thy blush ? 



CHAPTER LI. 

SEND NO I0EE BIBLES TO THE HEATHEN. 

A recent work by a Christian writer states that there are now 
employed in the work of converting the heathen to Christianity 
fifteen thousand missionaries, and that they succeed in convert- 
ing about ten thousand a year. From this statement, it appears 
that ten thousand missionaries make annually one convert apiece, 
while five thousand make none. And the cost the writer esti- 
mates to be about twenty thousand dollars for each convert. 
Col. Wiseman estimated it, about thirty years ago, to be ten 
thousand dollars apiece. And, while these ten thousand con- 
verts were made, the heathen population increased in numbers 



304 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

five millions. Thus it appears they increase two hundred times 
faster than they are converted. How long will it take, at such 
rates, to effect the entire conversion of the world? and what will 
be the cost ? All the gold ever dug from the mines of Golconda 
and California would be but a drop in the bucket compared with 
the requisite amount. The question naturally arises here, Do 
the results justify such an enormous expenditure of time and 
treasure, say nothing of the loss of health on the part of the 
missionaries? A learned Hindoo stated, in a speech made in 
London in 1876, that the conversions made in India are con- 
fined principally to the low, ignorant, superstitious class, who 
do not possess sufficient sense and intelligence to know the dif- 
ference between the religion they are converted to and the 
religion they are converted from. Are such converts worth 
ten thousand or twenty thousand dollars apiece? The case 
suggests the story of the Hibernian who stated his horse had 
but two faults : u First, he is hard to catch ; second, he is no 
account when caught." The heathen must be hard to convert 
if it requires an expense of ten thousand dollars apiece, and of 
but little account when converted if the}' know nothing about 
the nature of the religion they are converted to. There are 
various considerations which go to prove that the hundreds of 
millions of dollars expended annually in this enterprise are 
worse than wasted : — 

1. One missionaiy, becoming discouraged at the prospect, 
once made the statement that nine-tenths of the converts have 
not sense enough to understand the Christian religion, nor 
moral principle enough to live up to its precepts, and that a 
considerable portion of them reiftpsed into heathenism. It 
shook! be borne in mind that it is not the most intelligent nor 
the mosl mora] portion of the heathen who profess to embrace 
Christianity, but generally the credulous, ignorant, and liekle- 
minded class, who are ready for any change that may be offered. 

2, No real good seems to be accomplished by the introduc- 
tion of the Christian Bible among the heathen, but much evil. 

[^thousands Of bad moral precepts and had moral examples, 
and its -auction of every species of crime, must inevitably have 
the ellcct to weaken their moral resolutions, and deepen them in 



SEND NO MORE BIBLES TO THE HEATHEN 305 

the commission of crime. And hence, as missionaries them- 
selves indirectly confess, crime has increased in almost every 
nation where missions have been established. It is true, that, in 
those nations where the arts and sciences have been cultivated, 
they have operated to some extent in counteracting the bad 
moral lessons the}' learn by reading the Bible ; and in some 
cases, in this way, some improvement has been made. But no 
instance can be found in the history of the missionary enterprise 
where air^ improvement has been made in the morals of the 
people, where their instruction has been confined to the Bible, 
without the arts and sciences. On the contrary, their morals 
have grown worse, or remained unimproved, as in Abyssinia and 
the Samoan Islands, where, after more than a thousand }~ears' 
instruction in Bible religion, without the arts and sciences, they 
are still in the lowest stages of barbarism. (See Chapter 50.) 

" The Bible as a Moral Necessity." 

3. It is a policy that must be deplored by every true philan- 
thropist, that the Christian world expends millions of dollars 
every year to convert the heathen to a religion that can neither 
improve their morals or their intellect, but inculcates bad les- 
sons in morals and science, and, in many cases, is a worse 
religion than that already established in those countries. (For 
evidence, see Chapter 50.) 

4. And this policy becomes still more reprehensible when 
coupled with the fact that there are sixty thousand christians 
living in a state of want, beggary, destitution, and suffering, in 
Christian cellars in New- York City ; and two hundred thou- 
sand, including Boston and Philadelphia, who are in a state 
of degradation and suffering almost beyond description, who 
might be relieved and placed in a situation to improve their 
morals and their physical condition comfortably if the millions 
of mone} r , time, and labor were spent on them which are use- 
lessly expended on foreign missions. Think of two hundred 
thousand church-members living in dark, damp, dreary, sickly 
cellars, with grim starvation dairy staring them in the face, while 
their purse-proud Christian landlords are living in luxury over 
their heads. No such cruel, inhuman religion can be found in 
any heathen nation. 



306 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

5. And then the missionary enterprise inflicts physical evils, 
as well as moral, upon the foreign heathen. It introduces habits 
and customs amongst them, which, in some cases, clestro}' their 
health, as well as corrupt their morals. Look, for example, at 
the Sandwich Islands. Since the establishment of Christian 
missions amongst them, the population has decreased thirty 
per cent. Twent}^ thousand children in schools in 1848 are 
dwindled down to eleven thousand. Marriages have decreased, 
and divorces have increased. Nine hundred divorces took 
place in four years, while previous to the introduction of Chris- 
tianity, we are told, divorces were almost unknown. Mission- 
aries, ignorant of physiolog} T and the laws of mental science, 
and in total disregard of natural law, establish habits among 
the heathen which destroj- both their health and their happiness. 

6. The people in several heathen countries have proved to be 
sharp-sighted and intelligent enough to detect the errors in the 
Bible and religious system presented to them by the mission- 
aries. Bishop Colenso states, that, while serving as missionary 
among the Zulus tribe, some of the natives started objections 
to statements found in the Bible which had not occurred to his 
own mind. And this fact made him resign his mission and 
return home, and read his Bible with more care, which resulted 
in detecting hundreds of errors in the Holy Book, which he has 
published to the world in a large volume. We are informed 
that the Hindoos told some of the missionaries while among 
them, that such a God as the Christian Bible describes would 
not be allowed to run at large in their country. lie would be 
taken up as a criminal, 

7. The natives in several countries where the missionaries 
have been operating, on becoming acquainted with the character 
of the teachings of the Christian Bible, have raised objections to 
its being circulated amongst them, and. in some eases, have 

lougbt the missionaries to leave. The Eev. Mr, Hall, a mis- 
sionary i:i I;i<lia. states that a public meeting was called at 
Madras by the natives to draw up a petition to Lord Stanley 
Of England to -end no more missionaries, and also entreat him 
to withdraw those then operating there; and such was the 
interest manifested that the meeting called out ten thousand 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND BO TO BE SAVED? 307 

people. The Chinese, also, have manifested strong opposition 
to the movements of the missionaries among them ; while the 
Japanese have kept out from amongst them both Bible and 
missionaries by positive law until a recent period. 

8. The inhabitants of the Friendly Isles, of Honolulu, of 
India, and also of Japan, have all discussed the subject of send- 
ing missionaries to this country to improve the morals of the 
Christians ; and it is certain that some of them are practically 
acquainted with a better system of morals than that which pre- 
vails in this country. 

Here we will note the remarkable circumstance that a learned 
Hindoo has recently held a two days' debate with a Christian 
missionary, which excited such an interest that it drew together 
from five to seven thousand of the natives, who desired to see 
the missionary beat in the debate. A writer states that the 
Hindoo handled the missionary's arguments as a cat would a 
mouse, thus intimating that the missionary was completely van- 
quished in the logical contest ; and yet this Hindoo is called 
a "heathen." Pshaw! It would be a blessing to Christian 
countries to be supplied with a few millions of such heathen. 
It would improve both their morals and their intelligence. 

Note. — Many anecdotes are afloat tending to prove the superior moral honesty of the 
Hindoos and other "heathen." As a traveler was walking the streets of an Asiatic city 
with one of the natives, he proposed to step into a store and purchase some article. 
" No," said the native : " see that chair in the door to let us know the merchant is ab- 
sent. " — " What ! " exclaimed the traveler : "do merchants go away and leave their goods 
exposed in that way?" — "Yes," responded the honest native, "when there are no 
Christians about." 



CHAPTER LII. i 

WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 

u What shall we believe and do in order to be saved? " is an 
all-important query, and one which daily occupies the minds 
of millions of earth's inhabitants of all countries and all climes. 
There are ten thousand answers to this question, and they are 
as conflicting as the confusion of tongues at the Tower of Babel. 
No two religious orders, and scarcely any two religious belie v- 



308 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

ers, agree with respect to the all-important answer to be 
rendered to this all-important question. To prove this, we will 
interrogate the disciples of all the leading religious orders who 
have found a place in the world's history, and compare their 
answers, and observe the result. Commencing in the order of 
time, the disciples of the Vedas will be the first we will 
interrogate, as they represent the oldest religious faith that has 
ever been promulgated in the world. 

I. Hindoo's Answer to the Question. 

Well, brother Hindoo, will you be so good as to answer this 
question, " What shall we do and believe in order to be saved ? " 
" Oh, yes ! " responds the devout worshiper of Brahma, point- 
ing to a stone arche.d pagoda. " Go and prostrate yourself in 
that hoi}' building, made venerable bj' a thousand years' devo- 
tion, and offer up pra}-er and praise to Brahma, and, if you 
have committed an}' sins, implore his forgiveness. You must 
also believe in his Holy Book, the Vedas, and obey its precepts, 
which enjoin virtue and holiness, and forbid theft, robbery, 
murder, lying, dishonesty, adultery, and other crimes ; and 
you must not only believe in the Holy Book as God's revealed 
will to mankind, but you must believe it is all true, — every word 
of it. You must believe, also, that it existed in the mind of the 
great God Brahma from all eternity ; and some nine thousand 
3-ears ago was revealed by him to certain holy men, known as 
rishis, or prophets, who recorded it in a book for the instruction 
and salvation of the world ; and that this divinely revealed and 
perfect book contains all knowledge, past, present, and future, 
and ofl the religion necessary to save the whole human race. 
And. if yon would become a true-born saint [i.e., in Christian 
language, "regenerated and born again"], you must read the 
Holy Book through upon your bended knees. [And thousands 
of its most pious and devout disciples have performed this 
humble and laborious task.] And if you would advance still 
farther in soul-purification and true sanctity, so as to become a 
thrice-born saint [for they hold thai the oftener you are horn 
the better], then you must commit the divine volume all to 
memory. [And many of them, we are assured, have accom- 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 309 

plished this herculean task.] But you can not attain to 
complete and perfect holiness as a Hindoo saint, unless you 
forsake the busy scenes of life, retire to lonely places, and 
devote ^yourselves to a life of religious contemplation." By 
leading this austere, self-denying life, they hold that men and 
women can attain to complete holiness, and draw near to the 
spirit of God, and become so exalted in his favor as to receive 
important revelations from him, and be enabled by him to 
perform great miracles, such as casting out devils, raising the 
dead, handling fire without being burned, and swallowing poi- 
son without being killed or injured, and finally become Gods, 
and ascend to heaven in mortal bodies after the manner of 
Enoch and Elijah. In one respect some of the sects are much 
more consistent than Christian professors. Believing, as Chris- 
tians have always professed to do, that sickness is often sent by 
God as a punishment for sin, they never send for a physician, 
nor allow one to treat the case ; because, as they argue, trying 
to cure it would be trying to counteract the judgment of God, 
and thus bring down his vengeance upon the heads of those 
guilty of this sin. Here Christians might learn an important 
moral lesson of the heathen, — that of living up to the doctrines 
they preach. 

We have, then, the Hindoo answer to the question, "What 
must we do and believe in order to be saved ? ' • 

The Egyptian's Answer. 

Well, brother disciple of the old Egyptian religion, let us 
hear your answer to the question, ' ' What must we do and 
believe in order to be saved? " — " Well," replies the believer 
in this ancient order of faith, " if you would make a sure thing 
of escaping the pangs of hell, and being saved in the heavenly 
mansion, you must not neglect to pray dail}- to the great God 
Tulis, crucified some twenty-eight hundred 3-ears ago for the 
sins of mankind ; and, if you have committed any sin, 30U 
must pray to him to have them canceled from 4 The Book of 
Life.' [For the ancient Egyptians believed and taught that 
our evil deeds, as well as our good deeds, are recorded in t4 The 
Book of Life," in which St. John represents (see Rev. 22-19.) 



310 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

our good deeds alone as being registered.] And, if you would 
make a sure thing of being saved in 'the day of judgment, ■ 
you must intercede with Divine Mercy to erase your evil deeds 
from this Book of Life, so that they will not stand against you 
in that solemn hour." Here we find a few of the duties enu- 
merated which the disciples of that ancient S}'stem of religion 
believed and taught were necessary to be comprised in your 
religious creed in order to be saved in the great day of accounts. 

The Chinese Answer. 

We will now interrogate the representative of the religion 
of "The Five Volumes," and hear his answer to this most 
important question that ever occupied the thoughts of the human 
mind. Well, then, brother Chinaman, please tell us what we 
shall do and believe in order to reach the heavenly kingdom 
when compelled to quit the things of time. "Why, the most 
important thing of all is, to perform your daily vows to God, and 
worship him through images prepared to represent him, whether 
those images are made of wood or stone or metal, though 
you are not to consider these images as the veritable living and 
true God." For no nation was ever so brainless or stupid as 
to believe that idols or images made of mere inanimate matter 
were living beings, much less a living God. No ! the images 
which have been represented by Christian writers as being 
objects of worship in numerous heathen countries have been 
nothing more than mere imaginary likenesses of the Divine 
Being, and were gotten up for the same purpose that Christian 
men obtain photograph likenesses of their absent friends, and 
hang them on the walls of their dwellings. The object is sim- 
ply to keep the images of our friends impressed on our minds 
in their absence ; and the same motive actuates the idolater in 
making supposed Images of an absent God. The object is 
simply to have something before them that will keep them 
in remembrance of him, and his laws and commandments, — a 
very laudable motive, most certainly. They are idolaters, i; 

true; and so are all nations who believe in a personal God, 
whether called Jew, pagan, or Christian: for idolatry is de- 
fined to be '• image-making and image-worship;" and both 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 311 

of these acts all religious nations have been addicted to (Chris- 
tians not excepted) . This can be seen in a moment, when we 
look at the essential nature of idolatry : that is, the making and 
worship of images. All images are first formed in the mind. 
The Christian forms his conception of a personal God in his 
mind ; and the pagan does the same. Both thus make their 
mental images of God. The only difference in the two cases 
is, the pagan goes one step farther, and represents his image 
in wood, stone, or metal; but it is no more an image than 
while it existed only in the mind. Then it is evident there is 
no essential difference between them. Both are idolaters. For 
a further elucidation of this subject, see the chapter on idol- 
atry. And, if you would be saved by the Chinese religion, 
there are some practical duties you must perform. You must 
live up to the golden rule incorporated in their Bible nearly 
twenty-five hundred years ago. You must also observe the rite 
of water-baptism ; for it has been a religious ordinance amongst 
them for several thousand years. And, if you would attain to 
complete holiness, you must be kind to all human beings, and 
even all animals. Kill no living thing, and eat nothing after 
sundown. Then you can be saved by their religion. 

The Persian's and Chaldean's Answer. 
Brothers of the religion of Iran, can you tell us what to do and 
believe in order to be saved? " Yes, indeed. First of all, you 
must believe ' God's Living Word,' the Zenda Avesta ; for that 
is the meaning of the term. Zenda means ' the life ' or ' the 
living,' and Avesta, 'the word of God.' And you must live 
up to its holy precepts, which will keep you from committing 
sin, and prompt you to lead a virtuous life. You must also 
saj^ grace, both before and after eating, as that was their an- 
cient custom. But you are forbidden to speculate in any of 
the necessaries of life so as to cause suffering among the poor. 
And their Bible declares that he who hoards up grain, and holds 
it for a high price, is responsible for all the famine and all the 
miser}' that may take place among the people. [I would recom- 
mend modern Christian speculators to borrow this heathen code, 
and learn from it some important moral lessons.] To insure 



312 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

salvation under this religion, 3-ou must also believe in ' Mithra 
the Mediator,' crucified for the sins of the world some three 
thousand three hundred years ago by wicked hands, but in no 
case make any idols or images of God ; for their religion prac- 
tically condemns idolatry." 

The Japanese Answer to the Question. 

We will now hear from a c ' heathen ' ' nation distinguished 
for good sense, good morals, and practical honesty. 

Tell us, then, brother Japanese, what we must do and believe 
in order to be saved. " Well, first of all, you must keep the 
Christian Bible out of your houses. Don't suffer it to enter 
your doors. Let all Bibles alone, and obe} T the inward moni- 
tions of your own souls. Your own conscience and experience 
and moral sense will teach 3^011 that it is wrong to lie, wrong to 
swear, wrong to steal, wrong to cheat, wrong to get drunk, 
wrong to fight, and wrong to kill." Now let us learn some- 
thing about the moral character and practical lives of this 
tw heathen nation," who, for more than two hundred years, have 
kept Christian Bibles and Christian missionaries out from 
among them, most of the time by positive law. Dr. Oliphant 
and Col. Hall, who both spent some considerable time amongst 
them, state that they are an honest, upright, moral, and sober 
people. With respect to honesty of dealing, sobriety, and ab- 
stinence from swearing, quarreling, fighting, or any of the 
common vices of society, the best authorities assure us that 
no Christian nation on earth will compare with them : and yet 
they conscientiously refrain from reading the Christian Bible. 
(See Chapter L. of this work.) What a startling disproof is 
here famished to the declaration of Christian miters that the 
introduction of the Christian Bible, and the establishment of 

the Christian religion amongst the heathen, are essential to the 

existence Of good morals amongst them! In many cases more 

m! would he effected bj reversing the practice, and Bending 

heathen missionaries into Christian nations, as the pious pagans 
Of China, India, and the Friendly Isles have all been talking 
1 nd some of the godly people of India have already 
entered 14)011 the work. 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND BO TO BE SAVED? 313 

The Mahomed an Answer to the Question. 

Brother disciple of the Koran, will you please to tell us what 
the one hundred and fifty million of followers of the great 
prophet believe is necessary to do and believe in order to be 
saved? " Yes, certainly. The devout believers in this soul- 
saving religion have understood this question for more than a 
thousand years, and know exactly how to answer it. You 
must believe that the Holy Book (the Koran) is God's last 
revelation, and his last will and testament to mankind ; and 
you must shape your practical lives by its precepts, which will 
make }X)u ' true saints,' and honest, upright, and righteous men 
and women. You must also believe that the great prophet is 
the true, holy, and appointed messenger of God, and that 
Allah is the only true God. To believe, as Christians do, that 
God is divided into three persons or beings, or three attributes, 
or three branches, known as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, is 
not only a monstrous absurdity, but a monstrous sin and an 
unpardonable blasphemy ; and no man or woman who holds 
such doctrine can be saved. God is but one, and Allah is his 
name, and you must worship him seven times a da}^ ; and on 
the sabbath day (Friday) you must present yourselves at the 
mosque with the Holy Book in your hand, which, having kissed, 
you are then to place it upon the holy altar, and listen while the 
priest explains its great truths and its profound and godly 
mysteries." And " on such occasions," says Major Denham, 
" tears flow in abundance, as under Christian preaching." 

Here, then, you have the terms of salvation and the road 
marked out to heaven by the believers in the Koran. 

The Christian Churches' Answer to the Question. 
And now, brethren of the Christian faith, we will listen with 
attention to your answer to the important question, " What 
shall we do and believe in order to be saved? " But Christian 
sects are so numerous, and their views so conflicting, we can 
only find room for the answers of a few of the leading churches. 



314 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

The Catholic's Answer, 

Well, brother Roman Catholic, as }X)u represent the oldest 
Christian denomination in existence, we will first hear from your 
Church in answer to this great question, "What shall we do 
and believe in order to be saved?'' — " Well, the question is 
easily answered. You must believe that the Bible is the inspired 
word of God ; that Jesus Christ is the son of God ; and that 
St. Peter, succeeded by the Pope, is his vicegerent on the earth. 
You must also worship, or at least believe in the divinity of, 
the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and the Virgin Mary ; and 
adhere to the various rites and ceremonies of the Church." 

The Greek Christian's Answer. 

Well, brother disciple of the Greek Church, " what shall we 
do and believe in order to be saved ? ' ' What do you think of 
the Roman Catholic's answer? Is it correct? " No, indeed : 
far from it. It is an insult to God the Father and God the Son 
both to put either St. Peter or the Pope at the head of the 
Church. That is the office and mission of Jesus Christ the 
Savior ; and he will never save you while you believe such blas- 
phemous doctrine." Away then goes the old mother-church, 
with her hundred and fifty millions of souls, down into the 
bottomless pit, being ruled out of heaven by the Greek Church ; 
that is, doomed to eternal perdition, according to the testimony 
of the Greek Church. 

The Presbyterian's Answer to the Question. 
Well, brother of the Presbyterian order, we will now listen 
to your answer to the great question, u What shall we do and 
believe in order to be saved?' 1 How about the Greek Chris- 
tian's answer to the question? Is it right? Does he hold the 
true doctrine, or not? "No: \wy far from it, indeed. Like 
the Roman Christian, he believes in the divinity of the Virgin 
Mary, and consequently he is an idolater; and no idolater can 
be admitted into the kingdom of heaven." So away goes the 

old Greek Church, With her seventy million disciples, down into 
the world of endless WOe, If the testimony of our Presbyterian 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 315 

brother is to be relied upon. And thus two-thirds of all Chris- 
tendom, comprising the disciples of the Romish Church and 
the Greek Church, are doomed to an endless hell, according to 
their own witnesses. 

The Unitarian Christian's Answer. 
Our Unitarian brother will now please come forward, and tell 
us u what we must do and believe in order to be saved." Do 
you indorse any of the answers already obtained, or agree with 
any of the churches which have been interrogated upon this 
subject, or not? " No : very far from it." What! you don't 
dissent from the views of the Presbyterian Church upon this 
question, do you? " Yes, I do: for they worship 'the man 
Christ Jesus ' (as Paul truly calls him) , and, being but a man, 
they are idolaters (like the Roman and Greek Christians) for 
worshiping him as a God, and therefore cannot be saved, ac- 
cording to the Bible. He was born as a man ; he lived as a 
man ; he ate as a man ; he walked as a man ; he talked as a 
man ; he slept as a man, and finally died as a man. And he 
calls himself ' the son of man ' more than forty times, which 
would make him a man. For these and various other reasons 
we believe he could not have been a God, but only a man ; and 
therefore those who worship him as a God are guilty of idolatry, 
— the most heinous sin a man can commit, according to the 
Bible. And hence they can not possibly be saved, if the Bible 
teaches truly." Away then goes four hundred Protestant sects 
to the regions of eternal torment, if the testimony of Christian 
witnesses is to be believed and accepted in the case. 

The Jew's Answer to the Question. 
Brother Jew, can you show us the road to salvation, or tell us 
what to do and believe in order to be saved? u Oh, yes ! it is 
a plain question, and easily answered. You must believe that 
the Old-Testament Scriptures are the inspired word of God, 
and believe in its miracles and prophecies, though you are not 
to interpret or construe any of its prophecies as foretelling 
the coming and mission of Christ ; for, as we wrote them, we 
of course know exactly what they teach, and how to understand 



316 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

them. And we know most positively that they do not foretell 
the coming and mission of any such a being as Jesus Christ as 
the promised Messiah." 

"Now, look here, you wicked Jews," exclaim a hundred 
Christian sects, " you are denying ' the Lord who bought you,' 
and therefore can not be saved." So six millions of Jews are 
consigned by their Protestant brethren to endless torment, — 
given over to the buffetings of Satan to all eternity. 

The Methodist's Answer. 
Brother Methodist, perhaps you can do something towards 
settling this vexed and puzzling question, "What must we do 
and believe in order to be saved?" — " Certain^," exclaims the 
pious disciple of Wesley. "It is perfectly plain, and easily 
answered. You must believe in the Bible as the revealed will 
and word of God, and in Jesus Christ c the Son and sent of 
God ; ' and pour out your souls in prayer and praises to God, and 
shout ' Glory ' to his holy name." — " Stop ! stop ! " cries out the 
good, pious, quiet, broad-brimmed Quaker. " You can not be 
saved in that way. You drown the inward monitor of the Holy 
Spirit, which must be listened to and obeyed in order to insure 
salvation. You, by your noisy way of worshiping God, drown 
the voice of this inward monitor, and consequently hear and 
heed not its admonitions ; thus proving that you know nothing 
about the true way of worshiping God, or what true religion is. 
And therefore there is no chance for you to be saved." And 
thus two millions of Methodists arc doomed to eternal woe by 
their Quaker brethren. 

The Baptist's Answer. 
Brother Baptist, will you give us your opinion, or answer the 
question, l . 4 Wha1 shall we do and believe in order to be saved?" 
— "Oh,yesl the Bible is bo plain upon that subject that no 
honest reader can misunderstand it. You are to believe in the 
Bible : believe in Jesus Christ, and live up to his precepts ; and 
believe in, and practically observe, the sacred ordinance of 
water-baptism, — without which, according to the Bible, it is 
impossible to reach the kingdom, or inherit life everlasting." — 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 317 

"Stop, stop!" exclaims the drab-cloth Quaker again. "I 
perceive that the Baptists, as well as the Methodists, are not 
on the road to salvation. No man or woman can be saved who 
believes in, and relies upon, the external and carnal rite of 
water-baptism. It is a reliance on such outward performances 
that causes millions of ignorant and unconverted heathen to 
sink to endless ruin every year. They and you are dwelling in 
the outer court, and practically know nothing about the true 
religion essential to salvation, and hence can not be saved." 
— u Now, look here," exclaims the Campbellite Baptist, " water- 
baptism is one of the positive ordinances; and the Bible declares 
that no man or ivoman can be saved without a compliance with 
all the ordinances, from the least to the greatest. Therefore 
there is no chance for you infidel Quakers to get to heaven ; 
but you will, sooner or later, be consigned to the pit ' where the 
worm clieth not, and the fire is not quenched.' " And thus we 
might pursue the conflicting jargon of answers through all the 
churches. But we stop confused and confounded amid chaos, 
confusion, and contradiction. All seems to be wild conjecture 
and blind guess-work with regard to what we must do and be- 
lieve in order to be saved. There appears to be no way of 
learning any thing about the road to salvation by the churches. 
What is to be done ? 

The Quaker's Answer. 

Brother Quaker, as you profess to get light from above, per- 
haps } T ou can throw some light on this dark question. We have 
not yet heard your answer to this puzzling question. Can you 
tell us " what to do and believe in order to be saved " ? "Most 
certainly I can," replies the inspired disciple of Fox and Penn. 
' 4 There can be no mistake about what the Bible teaches on the 
subject. It is perfectly plain, and easily understood. You are 
to retire into the quiet, and turn your minds inward with a 
praj-erful desire to know the will of God. In this state of mind, 
open yotkr Bible, and you will learn that you are to do justly, 
love mercy, and walk humbly with God, and become estab- 
lished in the true faith : for the Bible declares that, ; without 
faith, it is impossible to please God ; ' that is, faith in his be- 



318 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

loved Son, whom he sent into the world to die a propitiatory 
offering for the sins of man." — " What ! " exclaims the Ilicks- 
ite Quaker, " do you mean to teach the dark and bloody doc- 
trine of the atonement ? Do }xm mean to say that we have to 
swim through blood to get to ' the house of mairy mansions ' ? 
If you do, you are egregiously mistaken. You are teaching and 
preaching an old, worn-out, bloody, heathen doefrine that never 
did and never can save a single soul." — " Now, look here," 
cries the orthodox Quaker, " the Bible declares, 'There is no 
other name given under heaven whereb}' men can be saved than 
that of Jesus Christ ; ' and you are blaspheming his name by 
denying the efficacy of his "death and sufferings. Therefore 
your chance for salvation is a hopeless one. You will be lost, 
and consigned to the pit where there is eternal weeping and 
wailing, and gnashing of teeth." So away go both the Quaker 
orders, each booked by the other for eternal perdition. But we 
must stop, or we will swell this chapter on the war of conflicting 
creeds to a volume. We have now interrogated all the leading 
churches relative to what it is necessary to do and believe in 
order to make a sure thing of salvation, and escape the awful 
and dreadful fate of endless damnation. And what is the 
result ? Xo two churches — and it could easily be shown that 
scarcely any two Christians — agree upon this all-important 
question, upon which they tell us is hung the salvation of the 
world. As we have shown, the churches all virtually shut the 
door of heaven against each other. The}' are all off the track, 
all on the rood to eternal damnation, according to the testimony 
of their own witnesses. In the name of God, what is the use or 
sense, then, of professing to believe in the Bible, or claiming to 
be Christians, when it is thus demonstrably proved that nobody 
knows any thing about what the Bible teaches, or what it takes 
to make a Christian? Hie picture we have presented is no 
mere fancy sketch. It is not the work of mere imagination. 
Hundreds, if not thousands, of quotations could be furnished 
from the writings of eminent Christian writers of the different 

Churches to show that it is a solemn reality, and that they differ 
in the way, and as widely, as we have represented. And what 

is the solemn lesson taught by it? Why, the absolute tmpo 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 319 

bility of our finding the road to heaven through the churches ; 
and it is an entire waste of time, besides being demoralizing to 
the mind, to attempt it. We are often told by the orthodox 
Christians, by way of defending their creeds, that the churches 
are agreed upon all the leading doctrines of the Christian faith. 
TV-ell, let us see how this is, and whether they in reality agree 
upon any thing. TVe will institute another court of inquiry, 
and briefly examine and compare the views of the various 
churches relative to the cardinal doctrines of the Christian 
religion. 

1. Moral Depravity. — The first in order will be the fall and 
depravity of man. 

Well, brother Calvinist, as } T ou hail from the oldest Protes- 
tant Church, we will first solicit your views upon this all-impor- 
tant question. We wish to know whether you believe that man 
fell from a state of purity, and became morally depraved by the 
fall. u Oh, yes! we believe he fell so low that he became 
totally depraved by the fall ; so that all men are now the children 
of wrath, born in sin, and conceived in iniquity, and covered 
with corruption from the crown of the head to the sole of the 
foot," 

Brother Arminian, what do you think of this view of the 
matter ? Is it Bible doctrine, or not ? ' l No : it is neither accord- 
ing to the Bible, nor according to common sense, but a damna- 
ble doctrine, that will send smy man's soul to hell who believes 
in such outrageous doctrine. It is not only untrue, but it is 
demoralizing to rob man so completely of his moral attributes 
as to make him feel like a brute, and, consequently, act like 
one." 

2. Man's Restoration. — How is this to be effected, brother 
Calvinist? " Why, by the outpouring of the blood of Christ, 
the propitiator}" offering." Brother Arminian, is this true 
Christian doctrine? "No, it is not. Man's salvation is ef- 
fected in no such a way. Eveiy man is to work out his own 
salvation. I can prove it by the Bible." 

3. Endless Punishment. — Most Protestant sects hold and 
preach that the wicked, when the}' die, are consigned to a place 
or state called iC the bottomless pit," (How they are kept in 



320 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

it with the bottom out, the Lord only knows, or perhaps we 
should say the Devil) . But the Universalists affirm that the 
Bible teaches no such doctrine, but tells us that, " as in Adam 
all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive ; " which proves, as 
the}^ affirm, the ultimate salvation of all the human race. But 
the Restorationists prove that there is c c a mediate place for 
souls, which is neither heaven nor hell, but a preliminary and a 
temporary abode for all souls, good and bad." 

And there is another class of Christians who find in the same 
book a still different doctrine, that of the absolute and total de- 
struction of the wicked. They quote Phil. 3-19. Which of these 
four Christian sects teach the true Bible doctrine ? Who can 
tell? 

4. Divinity of Christ. — Most of the Protestant sects tell us 
that the Bible makes a belief in the supreme divinity of Jesus 
Christ essential to salvation ; but the Parkerite Christian, the 
Hicksite Christian, and the Unitarian Christian affirm that it 
does not, that it onty makes him a perfect or superior specimen 
of manhood. Which is right? Who can tell? 

5. Polygamy. — Most of the churches once believed that 
polygamy is a Bible doctrine, and practiced it for eight, hundred 
years. But now they tell us it is not. The Mormons, how- 
ever, declare that it is sanctioned in the Old Testament, and 
not condemned in the New, and hence is a Bible doctrine. 
Which is right ? How can we tell? 

6. Marriage — Nearly all the sects hold that marriage is a Bi- 
ble institution. But the Shakers declare that it is not, and quote 
Christ's own words to prove it as found in Luke 20-35. •• The 
children of this world marry and are given in marriage; but 
they who shall he counted worthy of that world, and the resur- 
rection, neither many nor are given in marriage." They rea- 
sonably Conclude that those who shall not be considered worthy 

of being saved (which includes all married people) will not be 
s<n-r<i. being cut oil' by Christ's positive prohibition of mar- 
riage. Which is right? AYho can tell? The text, however, 
tarnishes a consoling hope for old bachelors and old maids, 
to Baj i he least. 

7. The Sabbath. — ^Iost of the churches keep the first day 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 321 

of the week as the Bible sabbath. But the Seventh-clay Bap- 
tists affirm that it is not, that the seventh day of the week is 
the true sabbath of the Lord ; while other sects tell us that 
Christ, both by precept and example, labored to do away with 
all sabbath observances and all holy days. Which is right? 
Who can tell ? 

8. The Godhead. — All Trinitarians teach that there are 
three persons in the Godhead. The Paulite Christians say there 
are but two, while the Unitarians affirm there is but one. Which 
is right ? Who can tell ? 

9. Baptism. — The churches are not agreed with regard to 
baptism as to what it is, how, and when it should be applied, 
and on whom it should be administered. Some hold to dip- 
ping, some to douching, and some to sprinkling, as the scripture 
mode of administering it. Which is right? Who can tell? 

I should prefer the dipping process. It would do something 
toward saving the body of the sinner from disease, if not the 
soul from hell, if frequently applied. He should be baptized 
once a week, if not once a day, with water and soap. We have 
now enumerated nearly all the leading doctrines of the Christian 
faith, and shown that the views of the churches, with respect to 
them, are about as different as day from night. The impor- 
tant query then arises, What progress have we made' towards 
determining, by the Bible or by the churches, what we must do 
and believe in order to be saved ? Why, about the same prog- 
ress the boy had made toward reaching the schoolhouse, who, 
on being interrogated by the teacher as to the cause of his late 
appearance, replied, " Why, master, you see the road was so 
slippery, that, when I attempted to take one step forward, I 
slipped two steps backward." — " How did you manage to get 
here, then?" asked the teacher. "Why," replied Tom, " I 
turned round and went the other way." I would suggest that 
the churches try this policy. of turning round, and going the 
other way. My conviction is they would find the true road to 
salvation much sooner, and be better prepared to settle the ques- 
tion as to what they should do and believe in order to be saved. 
It is a question, however, they never can settle. The Bible is 
a very old book ; and, the farther we get away from the age in 



322 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

which it was written, the more difficult it will become to under- 
stand it : for human language, and even human thought and 
the meaning of words, are constantly changing. These circum- 
stances will constantly augment the difficulty of ever under- 
standing any old Bible, or of determining what it teaches or 
designed to teach with respect to an important doctrine. 

10. TJie Number of Hells. — When the disciple of the 
Christian faith talks of a hell in the presence of a Hindoo, he 
tells him he don't know any thing about the matter : that there 
are no less than three institutions of this kind. But here the 
Mahomed an rises up, and says, " You, too, are totally igno- 
rant on the subject ; for there are no less than seven institutions 
of this character. One of them is set apart for Christians 
who believe in the divinity and atonement of Christ.''* Lieut. 
Lynch, of the United-States navy, says that a Mahomedan 
told him, u No man or woman can be saved who believes that 
God was born of a woman, and then became a malefactor to a 
human tribunal ; for the doctrine is blasphemous." Which of 
all these opinions is right? Who can tell? 

11. Bible Doctrines constantly changing. — The increase of 
intelligence, and the growth and expansion of the human mind, 
have the effect to change the views of the people generally and 
constantly upon almost every subject that occupies the mind ; 
so that the creeds of the churches are constantly changing. 
Hence the Bible is made to teach widely different doctrines in 
different ages ; and what is Christianity to-day is infidelity to- 
morrow, and vice versa. (See Chapter lviii.) And so thor- 
ough is the change wrought upon the meaning or interpretation 
of nearly all the important texts in tc God's perfect revelation/' 
that it virtually makes a new Bible for each generation. 1 will 
present some proofs and illustrations of this statement by com- 
paring the doctrine of the churches of the last century with 
those «of the present. In the days of Jonathan Edwards, a 

hell, constituted of a lake of fire and brimstone, was preached 
in nearly all the Christian churches: also the doctrine of infant 
damnation, when the Methodists sang that beautiful and charm- 
in- hymn.— 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 323 

" For hell is crammed 
With infants damned, 
Without a day of grace; " 

also the doctrine of predestination, the doctrine of election 
and reprobation, the doctrine of purgatory, the doctrine of 
Christ's descent into hell, &c. All these and other similar 
doctrines were preached in nearly every pulpit nearly every 
sabbath ; and the preacher who would have neglected to preach 
these doctrines would have been denounced as on the road to 
hell. But now the clergyman who should attempt to preach 
these old Calvinistic tenets would be denounced as ' ' an old 
fogy-" Hence the important query arises, When were the 
churches preaching Bible doctrine, then or noiv? Who can tell? 
Such changes are unceasingly going on. Important changes 
are sometimes made in the popular creed in a few } T ears' time, 
as we will cite a case to prove. Just before the last war the 
peace doctrine was becoming quite popular in nearly all the 
churches, and sermons were often preached from such texts as 
the following : t c Nation shall not lift up sword against nation ; 
neither shall they learn war any more." But, when the war 
broke out, new texts were hunted up, and the preaching all ran 
in the opposite direction. " Cursed be he who holdeth back his 
sword from blood" (Jer. xlviii. 10) ; " He who hath not a 
sword, let him sell his coat, and buy one," — then constituted the 
texts for a sound sermon. Now it is evident that a book which 
thus teaches opposite doctrines virtually teaches nothing. Its 
moral force is destroyed. If a man wants to perform a certain 
act to-day, and an act of an opposite character to-morrow, and 
can find a warrant for both in the Bible, then it is evident the 
Bible can have no effect whatever towards changing his course 
of life. When every moral duty is both commanded and 
countermanded, and every crime both sanctioned and con- 
demned, as appears to be the case with the Christian Bible, 
then it is evident that a man with the Bible would act exactly as 
the man without the Bible ; for whatever he may naturally feel 
inclined to do, or whatever he wants to do, he finds Bible 
authority for. Hence it is evident the Bible can't change his 
conduct in the least ; for it merely tells him to do what he wishes 



324 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

to do, and had made up his mind to do. I will prove this posi- 
tion by citing several cases for illustration. We will suppose a 
man has become convinced by observation, or his own expe- 
rience, that it is wrong to drink intoxicating liquors, and wants 
Bible authority for preaching temperance. He can find it by 
turning to Isa. v. 22: "Woe unto them that are mighty 
to drink wine." But a friend of his, a member of the 
same church, living in the city, where there is great demand 
for intoxicating beverages, wants to make some money by 
selling it. He finds the authority for that act also in Deut. 
xiv. 26 : " Thou shalt spend thy money for oxen, or for sheep, 
or for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatever thy soul lusteth 
after. ,, Another Christian becomes very angry, and filled with 
the spirit of a murderer towards a neighbor, and concludes to 
kill him. He finds Bible authority for it in the text, "Go ye 
out and slay eveiy man his companion, every man his brother, 
and every man his neighbor " (Exocl. xxxii. 27) . Another pious 
Christian has become convinced, by " the logic of histoiy," that 
all war and fighting is wrong, and hence concludes to preach 
the doctrine of peace. He finds Bible authority for that in the 
Decalogue: "Thou shalt not kill." Another devout Chris- 
tian, whose common sense has taught him that it is wrong for 
one human being to enslave another, wants Bible authority 
against the practice. He finds it in the text, " Thou shalt pro- 
claim liberty through all the land," &e. Another godly saint, 
living in a slave-holding country, and being both a tyrant and a 
mammon worshiper, wants Bible authority for trafficking in the 
blood and bones of his fellow-beings. lie finds it in Lev. xxv. 
45: " Of the heathen round about you shall ye buy bondmen 
and bondmaids, and they shall be your possession for ever; " so 
he knows it is nil right. And thus this exposition might be 
continued so as to show that there is no crime, no sin, no vice, 
and no wicked i]^n\ but that is both sanctioned and condemned 

by u GocPs Holy Word," and no moral duty that is not both 
commanded and countermanded ; thus proving it to be abso- 
lutely impossible to follow it as a guide without being led into 
the commission of every species of sin. crime, and abomination, 

prompted to the practice of virtue. Every person 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 325 

who has not made shipwreck of common sense must see at 
once that it is utterly impossible to learn any thing about what 
is right and what is wrong, what is sin and wickedness, and 
what is virtue', what is morality and what is immorality, or 
what he should approve, and what condemn, what he should do 
and what leave undone, or, finally, any thing about the duties 
of life or the rules and principles of morality, b} r such a book. 
What can such a book, then, be worth, either in the cause of 
religion or morality ? Where, oh ! where is the common sense 
of Christendom ? It is wonderful to what extent rationality and 
good sense have been banished from the human mind in all Bible 
countries by a false and perverted education. It can not be 
wondered at that we have so many antagonistic churches with 
innumerable conflicting creeds, when we examine and learn 
something about the endless contradictions and confusion of 
the teachings of the book on which they are founded. 

Six Hundred Roads to Heaven. 

We are swamped with endless difficulties in determining what 
to do and believe in order to be saved either by the Bible or 
the churches, when we look at the fact that there are, as 
some writers have computed, more than six hundred conflicting 
churches, each one claiming to preach and to teach the only 
true and saving faith of the gospel, and yet differing heaven- 
wide with respect to what constitutes that true and saving faith. 
They point out six hundred roads to heaven, when Christ says 
there is but one, — "One Lord, one faith, and one baptism." 
The churches are simply guessing institutions, and their creeds 
so many stereotyped s} T stems of guess-work. How much has 
been learned, or what important questions have been settled, 
either in religion or morals, by the nearly two thousand 3-ears' 
reading and study of the Christian Bible ? The six hundred 
jarring churches, and their constantly increasing number, fur- 
nish a sufficient answer to this question. What a ludicrous 
aspect would the cause of science now be in, and what torrents 
of ridicule and contempt would be poured upon our institutions 
of learning, if the} 7 differed in their principles, or with respect 
to the principles of an} T branch of science, as the churches differ 



326 TIIE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

frith respect to the doctrine of the Bible ! We will illustrate b}- 
an imaginary examination of the students of one of our insti- 
tutions of learning with respect to their attainments in mathe- 
matics. A class having recited, we will interrogate each one 
separately. "Well, John, as you have been studjing figures 
several years, can you now tell us how many are twice two? " — 
"Yes, sir: twice two are six." — "Very well: take your seat. 
The next student will rise. James, can you tell us how many 
are twice two?" — "Yes, I can: twice two are eleven." — 
" Very well : be seated, and let Tommy rise. Tommy, as }'ou 
are a diligent student, and have been through the arithmetic and 
the principal text-books, please tell us how man}' are twice 
two." — "I will. It is a plain case : twice two are fourteen." — 
"Very well: stand aside. That intelligent-looking boy 3'onder 
we will hear from now. Well, Moses, can you tell us, as the 
result of your five years' close study of mathematics, how man}' 
are twice two?" — " Certainly I can. To be nice and exact 
about the matter, twice two are nine and a half." — "Very 
well : I am done with you. There is one more student to be 
interrogated. Well, Solomon, can you do any thing towards 
settling the disputed question, how many are twice two?" — 
" Yes : I am astonished there should be any difference of opin- 
ion about the matter, when it is plain that no person who is 
really in earnest to understand it can fail to see that twice two 
are seventeen." Such an institution of learning as this would 
be broken up as a nuisance in less than two hours after it was 
known to exist ; and yet it furnishes a striking illustration of the 
character and condition of our theological institutions in which 
are professedly taught the science of Christianity and the Bible. 
The difference among the professors and students of theology 
i- a- great and important as in the former supposed case ; and 

were not the eves of the soul put out. and the Christian secta- 
rians rendered blind by their false or mistaken teachers, they 

would see that this is a true picture of their condition. We will 
institute .•mother illustration. The Christian churches are virtu- 
ally six hundred guide-boardfl professedly pointing the way to 

heaven. Let us suppose a traveler, hunting his way to** the 
Queen City of the West," finds on a hill a tree or post, to which 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND BO TO BE SANEBf 327 

are nailed six hundred guide-boards pointing in six hundred dif- 
ferent directions, and all labeled " To Cincinnati." How much 
would he learn from them about the proper road to travel to reach 
the city? The chance of striking the right course would lay 
within six hundred guesses ; and those guesses could be made as 
well without the guide-boards as with them. And it is equally 
certain, and most self-evidently certain, that the road to heaven 
could be found as well if there were no churches and no Bibles 
pointing six hundred different directions. Indeed, the chances 
of finding it would be much better without them, because the 
minds of the people are confused and confounded, and their 
time wasted, their mental and spiritual vision darkened, and 
their judgments weakened, by attempting to grope their way 
through such a labyrinth of chaos, confusion, and uncertainty, 
which really incapacitates them for searching and finding the 
right way and the sure road " to the kingdom." 

One Hundred and Fifty Bible Translations and Commen- 
taries. 

When we learn that there have been no less than one hundred 
and fifty different translations and commentaries upon the Bible 
put in circulation, we can see at once that this is calculated 
to greatly augment the difficulty of ever arriving at any thing 
like a unity of belief among the churches, or of settling the 
question as to what it is necessary to do and believe in order 
to be saved, or of finding the road to heaven through the 
churches. Translation after translation of the Bible has been 
made by different churches, each one alleging that all preceding 
translations were full of errors. The learned Dr. Robinson of 
England has estimated that some of the modern translations 
of the Bible, made for the special purpose of getting the errors 
out of " the Holy Book," contain the frightful number of one 
hundred and fifty thousand errors ; and the American Christian 
Union, now engaged in translating the Bible, declare that our 
present popular version, translated by fifty-four of the most 
learned Christian scholars, and which has long been an estab- 
lished standard authority in a large portion of Christendom, 
and regarded as nearly perfect, yet contains twenty-four thou- 



328 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

sand errors. How many more translations we are to have, God 
only knows. The thought occurs here, that, by the time all the 
errors are gotten out of the Bible in this way, there will not be 
much of it left, — that it will not be much larger than "Poor 
Richard's Maxims," or a common-sized almanac. Now, to show 
the utter impossibility of establishing any doctrine or settling 
an}' question in theology by the Bible, or of learning any thing 
about what constitutes Christianity, or what we are to do and 
believe in order to be saved, we have ov\y to compare some 
of these translations together, and observe the wide difference 
in their teachings, and the fatal contradictions in their doctrines 
and precepts. We will cite a few examples b}' way of proof 
and illustration. In our translation, known as " King James's 
Bible," a text makes Christ say, "A spirit hath not flesh and 
bones, as you see I have " (Luke xxiv. 39) ; but, in the most 
popular translation in Europe (the Douay) , this text is made 
to read, " A spirit hath not flesh and blood, as you see I have 
not." Here is a direct contradiction. One of these Bibles 
makes Christ say he is a spirit, and the other that he is not, 
which is a flat, and almost a fatal, contradiction. Now* where 
on earth is the tribunal to which we can appeal to find out 
which of these translations is right? or how can the matter be 
settled ? Again : the text which in our own version is made to 
read, "There are three that bare record in heaven, — the Father, 
Son, and Holy Ghost," reads in another translation. "There 
are three witnesses, — the icater, the blood, and the 1 spirit" 
which knocks the trinity and divinity of Jesus Christ both out 
of the Bible, bo far as they arc founded upon this text. We 
will cite one more example: "The wonderful Messianic proph- 
ecy " as it is called (found in Isa. ix. 6.)., — which reads In our 
translation, ■■ Into us a child is born*, unto us a son is given, 

he shall be culled Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the 

Everlasting Father," &c, — is made in another translation to 

. instead of "the Mighty God/- **ihc Mighty Hero," and, 

in icad of " the Everlasting Father. V " the Father of the ever- 
lasting age," ^''.. which shows that the text is not a prophecy at 
all. and ha- no more reference to ,!e>ii> Christ 'than to Mahomet. 
••'Hie Mighty IJero" is not a term that is ever applied to Gk)d, 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 329 

but to bloody warriors. Now, who is to settle the question as 
to which of these translations is the right one ? It will be ob- 
served, then, that we have, in the fifty contradictory translations 
of the Bible, no less than fifty contradictory moral codes and 
fifty contradictory systems of doctrines, which are virtually fifty 
assumed-to-be-perfect revelations from God (of course, all in- 
fallible) . Now, let us multiply the number of Christian sects 
(six hundred) by the number of Bible translations and commen- 
taries (one hundred and fifty), and we will have indicated the 
number of roads marked out to heaven by the churches. The 
result is ninety thousand (600 X 150 = 90,000). Here, then, 
we have ninety thousand roads leading to ' ' the house of many 
mansions,' ' which suggests the conclusion that nobocty can pos- 
siblj miss getting there ; for we must presume that it would be 
impossible to travel in any direction without striking one of 
these numerous roads : so that the world of sinners may be 
comforted with the assurance they will all be saved. "The 
broad road" they are traveling must be intersected at many 
points by some of these man}^ pathways to paradise ; and they 
have onl} r to turn off at the last crossing to be landed safe 
in "kingdom come. 5 ' They have therefore ninety thousand 
chances of being saved by traveling "the broad road," if they 
prefer that to one of " the straight and narrow roads." This 
soul-saving system may be regarded as a lottery scheme in 
which there are eighty-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety- 
nine blanks, and but one prize. Who would risk a farthing in 
such an investment, with eighty-nine thousand nine hundred 
and ninety-nine chances against drawing any thing? Certainly 
no person with common sense or any intelligence. We will 
use an illustration. We will suppose the proprietor of a brick 
building comprising ninety thousand bricks, one of which con- 
tains a gold medal w r orth one thousand dollars, sa} T s to one of 
his neighbors, "Sir, the walls of this building comprise ninet}- 
thousand bricks, and one of them contains a gold medal worth 
one thousand dollars. If you will step to it, and put 3 T our finger 
on it, you can have it." Can we suppose he would be very 
sanguine about winning the gold medal? Certain^ not. We 
will make another illustration. We will suppose the Queen of 



330 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

England sends a company of a thousand men to Australia to 
dig for a treasure known to have been buried there during a 
war, the locality of which she describes in writing so accurately 
that she presumes there can be no difficulty in finding it. In a 
few weeks she dispatches a messenger to the island to ascertain 
what progress the miners are making. But imagine his sur- 
prise, on reaching the place, to learn that the laborers are 
divided up into six hundred companies, and each company 
stoutly insisting that the spot where they are digging answers 
exactly to the locality described by the written instrument. 
Now, on the messenger reporting the case to the queen, what 
would she conclude — ay, what could she conclude — but that she 
had made some serious blunder or omission in her attempted 
description of the place? It is not possible that an explicit 
revelation of the matter could have led to such endless confu- 
sion and disputes. In like manner we are morally compelled 
to conclude — yes, every principle of reasoning and common 
sense impels us to the conclusion — that God has made a serious 
blunder in attempting to give forth a perfect revelation to the 
world, if (as it seems) he has left it so ambiguous, so unintelli- 
gible, and so contradictory in its doctrines and teachings, that 
six hundred churches have risen up, and are now disputing 
about what its doctrines and teachings are. These six hundred 
churches comprise a hundred and fifty millions of guessing 
Christians, nil guessing their way to heaven, with ninety thou- 
sand chances against their ever reaching the heavenly kingdom. 
To " the angel host" looking down, observing this infinite di- 
versity, demoralization, and conflict among the discipleig of the 
Christian faith, it must be regarded as a species of religious 
monomania ; Cor we may assume that no intelligent mind, which 
UB not blinded by religions superstition, could he drawn into such 
a delusion as to conclude that such a hook or such a religion or 
revelation is from an all-wise and all-powerful GrOd, or that it is 

necessary to believe it. or that it is possible to believe it in any 

rational Bense, <>r that it can have the remotest connection with 

our salvation. It makes God a fool, man a lunatic, religion a 

farce, and the Bible supcrlat ive DOBSenSe. Revelation is defined 
to he •• the act of making known.' 1 lint what is made known by 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND DO TO BE SAVED? 331 

a book whose language is so contradictory and so ambiguous that 
no two persons in a million agree with respect to all it teaches ? 
Every preacher and teacher simply makes known his ignorance 
whenever he assumes to know what the Bible teaches ; and yet it 
is called ;i a perfect revelation of God's will." It is an assump- 
tion that makes God an ignoramus and a tyrant to suppose he 
would give forth a perfect revelation to the world, and require us 
to accept it as such on pain of endless damnation, and yet leave 
it in such a jumbled, bungling, and unintelligent condition that 
it is impossible to understand it. Such an assumption certainly 
borders on blasphemy. We would charge him with no such 
driveling nonsense. It is the legitimate prerogative of reason 
to assume that a perfect being could make a perfect revelation 
or Bible, the language of which should be so absolutely perfect 
and plain that no person of ordinary understanding could possi- 
bly fail to understand every text, every word, and every sylla- 
ble of it, and no two persons could possibly differ about the 
meaning of one text in the whole book. Such a revelation or 
Bible, and only such, could be ascribed to an all-wise God. 
Even men and women can now be found who are so far master 
of human language that they can write books so plainly that 
there can be no dispute about the meaning of one sentence in 
them. To assume, then, that an infinitely wise God could not 
produce such a book is to place him lower in the scale of intel- 
ligence than a common schoolbo}\ When, therefore, I find 
the Christian Bible so far from possessing such characteristics, 
I set it down as prima-facie evidence that an intelligent and 
all- wise God had nothing to do in originating it. And if he 
were not superior to, or incapable of, such human weakness, he 
would reject with contempt and disdain the honor, or rather dis- 
honor, ascribed to him in the authorship of such a book, — such 
a medley of contradiction, ignorance, superstition, and barbar- 
ism as is ascribed to him. 

It is sometimes alleged (as we have already observed) in de- 
fence or mitigation of the endless disputes among Christian 
professors about the teachings of the Bible, that this disagree- 
ment does not appertain to any of the essential doctrines of 
Christianity, but only to minor points, or doctrines of minor im- 



332 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

portance. But such an admission is fatal cither to their hon- 
esty or to their good sense. It concedes that the quarrels 
among the churches for ages has been about mere trifles, not 
worth spending breath about. It concedes that it is "non- 
essentials," or mere trifles, that keep them apart, and that have 
led them to build five or six churches, and hire five or six 
priests, in ever}' little village throughout the countiy, at an ex- 
pense of many thousand dollars. It is certainly a criminal 
waste of time and money to spend it by the million for churches 
and priests to propagate doctrines which the} T themselves admit 
possess no real intrinsic importance. It shows the} T have been 
actuated by selfish, dishonorable, and ignoble motives in fighting 
each other for a thousand years, and in some cases murdering 
each other by the thousand, for a difference of opinion they 
admit to be of no importance. Those murdered Christians and 
devout Bible-believers were charged with preaching damnable 
doctrines and devilish heresies ; but now we are told it was 
minor and unimportant doctrines that they were quarreling 
about, and for which they were tortured and killed for preach- 
ing. Yes, non-essential doctrine ! temporal mores ! But 
the} r make a serious blunder when they talk about non-essential 
doctrine ; for their Bible teaches that all doctrines are essen- 
tial, — that there is no such thing as a non-essential doctrine; 
for it first proclaims "one Lord, one faith, and one baptism." 
and then declares that " he who offends in the least, offends in 
the whole." 

These two declarations taken together prove (if they prove 
any tiling) that there is no "non-essential doctrine," and 
that the slightest departure from the right faith, or the least 
disregard of the most trivial doctrine of the Christian creed, 
will hind the soul of the man or woman in endless perdition 
who is guilty of it. The solemn question arises here, then. 

Who can escape eternal damnation? For, if there is only one 

true faith, then the hundred and forty thousand different and 
Conflicting faiths cherished and propagated among Christians 
must all be wrong but one, — a (act which impels us to the 

awful and inevitable conclusion that not one Christian in a thou- 
QOt in ten thousand — can he saved by these terms 



WHAT SHALL WE BELIEVE AND BO TO BE SAVED? 333 

of the gospel. The thought sometimes occurs to the writer, 
that no truly enlightened person, possessing a true moral dig- 
nity of character, could consent to hang his salvation upon 
a book which, after eighteen hundred years of the most criti- 
cal investigation and explanation by the most learned minds 
in Christendom, still remains a mystery with regard to all 
its most important doctrines, so that more than six hundred 
churches are now disputing about what it teaches ; and the 
difficult}' is still increasing by the uprising of new churches 
with new creeds and new interpretations of the Bible. Let 
the reader observe the striking difference in the harmony of 
views which prevail in the various scientific societies throughout 
the country and those of the churches, and he will discover at 
once that there is no science in our religion. Take for example 
the astronomical societies. They are all perfectly agreed with 
respect to what the great Bible of nature teaches concerning 
that science. There is no contention and no dispute with re- 
spect to the doctrines and principles of that grand revelation of 
nature, because they are all susceptible of proof and demonstra- 
tion. Were it otherwise, — were the amateurs and students of 
that science divided into six hundred conflicting factions, like 
the churches, each with a different theory with respect to what 
it teaches, — one contending that the sun rises in the east, 
another that it rises in the west ; one arguing that the sun is the 
revolving center of our solar system, another contending that 
the earth is ; one teaching that the starry orbs which roll their 
massive forms through infinite space are mere wax tapers stuck 
in the azure vault to light this pigmy planet, or mere peep-holes 
for Gods to look out upon our world ; and one arguing that they 
were all knocked up in a single day out of that singular sub- 
stance called nothing, and another that the}' are the outgrowth 
of other worlds, or have existed from all eternity. Had the 
author, who was once a member of one of those societies, ob- 
served such a chaos of confusion and conflict of opinion, he 
would have discovered at once that nothing is really known 
about the science of astronomy, — that what is called such is 
nothing but a jargon of conflicting dogmas and wild specula- 
tions. Hence he would not have remained with them a single 



334 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. • 

day after making such a discover}'. Having learned that the 
churches are in such a condition, he withdrew, and has not been 
a member of one of those discordant institutions for many 
years. He considers it a waste of time to be a member of a 
religious body which only increases this difficult}' and confusion. 
He has but one life to live, and does not wish to waste that in 
a mere wild-goose chase after religious speculations that can 
never be settled. Why fool away our lives in chasing theologi- 
cal butterflies that can never be caught, when there is a hun- 
dred times as much to be learned within the domain of positive 
science as can be acquired in a lifetime, that is practically use- 
ful and calculated to enlarge the boundaries of our knowledge 
and elevate us to a higher plane of happiness, while the occu- 
pancy of the mind with theological dogmas is only calculated to 
" lead to bewilder, and dazzle to blind " ? 

Yes, we shall make more progress in learning our duties, in 
learning cc what we must do in order to be saved," if we would 
look about us and forward, and endeavor to read the great Bible 
or book of nature illuminated by the rays of science, in which 
there are no contradictions, no confusion, and where we may 
learn of, and, in our finite measure, grow into and partake 
of the attributes of the Infinite Father, instead of looking 
backward and searching amongst the jarring contradictions, 
the creeds, dogmas, myths, and traditions of the past, covered 
as they are with the mold and dust of ages. 



CIIAFIER Lin. 

THE THREE PLANS OF SALVATION. 
11 Without the shedding of blood there can be no remission for 

sin." The doctrine of this text constitutes the basis of all the 
plans of salvation which various ages and nations have founded 
on dead Gods and living devils. Nearly every religious nation 
known to history cherished the belief that God is an irritable, 
irascible, and vindictive being, subjeel to fits or paroxysms of 
ger; and, when in this furious and unbalanced and ungov- 



THE THREE PLANS OF SALVATION. 335 

ernable state of mind, he frequently poured out his vengeance 
upon his disobedient children, often subjecting them to the most 
terrible penalties in this life, and then threatened them with a 
still worse doom in the next. To avert this direful calamity, — 
at least so far as it appertained to the life beyond the grave, — 
most religious nations invented schemes which came to be 
known as s} T stems or plans of salvation. The original model 
seems to have been furnished by the Hindoos, and borrowed 
from them by the Egj^ptians, and thence transmitted to the Per- 
sians and Grecians, and was finally incorporated into the 
Christian sj^stem, and now constitutes what is known as ' ' the 
Christian plan of salvation." Each sj^stem was composed of 
three cardinal principles : 1 . The primeval innocency and 
moral perfection of man. 2, His temptation and downfall into 
a state of moral depravity. 3. His restoration to the divine 
favor by the voluntary sacrifice and atoning offering of a God 
(one of the three members of the trinity). These three car- 
dinal doctrines constitute what Christians denominate ' ; the 
great and glorious plan of salvation," and on which a thousand 
volumes have been written, and ten thousand sermons are 
preached every 3~ear. As it professes to point out the road, 
and the only road, to heaven, it merits a somewhat critical ex- 
amination. We will therefore analyze and examine its several 
principles, to see whether it has a true moral basis, or is in strict 
accordance with the principles of natural justice. The first 
proposition assumes that man primordially occupied the highest 
plane of moral perfection, and that all his animal propensities 
were held in strict abeyance to his moral convictions, and that 
he consequently led a morally pure, perfect, and holy life. 
The first and most important query to which this proposition 
or assumption gives rise is, Can it be shown to be true? Can it 
be sustained by either the principles of natural or moral science, 
or by the facts of history comprised in man's practical life? 
Xow, it so happens that facts have been accumulating for thou- 
sands of years, gathered from almost every department of 
science and history, to prove and demonstrate that the proposi- 
tion is entirely untenable, — that it is not true. Geolog} r alone 
demonstrates its falsity. It has written its negative verdict 
upon a thousand rocks beneath our feet. 



336 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

These rocks contain the fossiliferous and organic remains of 
the early and primitive inhabitants of the earth, and indicate 
the order of man's moral and intellectual development ; for as 
each successive layer or stratum of fossiliferous rocks, in which 
the organic remains of man are found, marks a distinct period 
in his histoiy, and the growth of his moral and intellectual 
brain is found in all cases to correspond to the age and growth 
of these strata, the question is thus settled and demonstrated 
b} T the facts of geological science. As, the older the rocks, the 
more remote period they mark in man's history ; and, the more 
remote the period to which it is thus traced, the lower the posi- 
tion in the scale of moral and intellectual development his 
organic remains prove him to have occupied. The question is 
thus reduced to a scientific problem, which admits of no dis- 
proof or refutation. It is, then, a settled scientific truth, that, 
the further we trace the past histor}- of man by the footprints of 
geological science, the nearer he approaches to the condition 
of an animal, — when he was almost totally devoid of intellec- 
tual perceptions and moral feelings, and was consequently a 
victim to his lusts and animal propensities. Where, then, was 
his moral purity and perfection, or his angelic holiness? The 
doctrine is thus shown to be false and fabulous. All the skulls 
of the primitive races that have been found by geological re- 
search show that man, in his first rude type, had scarcely any 
moral brain; and the history of the race at that period shows 
that lie possessed a correspondingly low, weak, defective moral 
character, so much so that he could scarcely be considered a 
moral, accountable being. To talk, then, of his occupying a 
high moral plane at that early period, is to contradict every prin- 
ciple of science and every page of history. His animal propen- 
sities and selfish feelings must have held complete sway over the 
whole empire Of mind for thousands, if not for millions, of years ; 
SO that his moral status was but little above that of the brute. 
The facts Of science and history to prove this proposition are 

abundant ; but. as we are compelled to constantly observe the 

most rigid rules Of brevity, we can only find space for one or 

two proof-illustrations. Human skulls have been found em- 
bedded in the: locks of (Jibraltar with retreating foreheads, 



THE THREE PLANS OF SALVATION. 337 

prognathous jaws, and frontal bones an inch thick, and the re- 
ceptacles for both the moral and intellectual brain very small, — 
all of which denote very weak moral and intellectual minds, and 
a preponderance of the animal feelings ; and geologists have de- 
cided that sixt3^-five thousand years must have elapsed since 
those bones and skulls were deposited in those rocks. Hun- 
dreds of similar facts have been gathered by geologists, and 
might be cited : but this one case is amply sufficient, and fur- 
nishes as conclusive proof as a thousand could do that the prim- 
itive inhabitants of the earth were on a low mental status, and 
that they were greatly inferior in morals and intellect to the 
least-developed minds of the present age ; and consequently 
man's course has been upward, and not downward. There has 
been no falling, but a gradual rising, in both the moral and in- 
tellectual scale. It shows that man was at the very foot of the 
ladder at the commencement of his moral and intellectual 
career. — that he was flat on his back in the ditch ; and, conse- 
quently, there was no lower place to fall to. The first proposi- 
tion, then, is shown to be false, — that man originally occupied a 
high moral position, and that he was in a state of moral purity 
and perfection. 

The second proposition — that of man's fall and moral degen- 
eracy — is likewise shown to be false b} r the same facts ; for, if 
he was never in a state of moral purity and perfection, then it is 
evident he never could have fallen from such a state. It would 
be superfluous, then, to attempt to show that man never fell, 
after having shown that he never occupied a high moral position 
to fall from. He could only fall in the sense the Scotchman did, 
who stated he fell up a well sixty feet in a bucket. It is settled, 
then, geologically, scientifically, and demonstrably, that man 
never fell in a moral sense. 

We will now proceed to present what is presumed and assumed 
to be the scriptural exposition of man's original condition and 
fall. 

We are told in the first chapter of Genesis, that, when God 
had completed the work of creation, he pronounced it all, not 
only good, but " very good," which indicates a state of perfec- 
tion ; but it appears the words were hardly out of his mouth 



338 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

till a very bad being, called a serpent, came crawling into the 
garden on his back, to furnish practical evidence that Moses' 
God was mistaken in having pronounced every thing so c ' very 
good." We have to assume that he came into the garden of 
paradise on his back, because the reverse mode of traveling 
was not adopted until after the fall ; that is, till after he was 
doomed to that mode of travel as a punishment for having 
tempted and beguiled Mother Eve to try her new molars and 
incisors on some fruit (supposed to be pippins) hanging on a 
tree, which, it appears, underwent the rapid process of blossom- 
ing, and bearing fruit that ripened in a few hours after it was 
planted. And thus the serpent, although a senseless reptile, 
committed the first sin, — the first violation of moral law. The 
first question that naturally arises here is, Wiry was not the 
fence around the garden of paradise made snake-proof, so as to 
keep his snakeship out? Or shall we presume the gate was 
left open, and that he entered in that way? This, however, 
would indicate a blundering carelessness on the part of Jehovah, 
which we dare not assume. Another question arising here is, 
Why was not the angel with the flaming sword, which, we are 
told, was placed over the door or gateway to guard it from 
intruders, — why was he not placed there sooner? Why was he 
not placed there before the fall, instead of after, so as to bruise 
the serpent's head, or behead him, on his attempting to enter? 
To place a guard over the gate after the Devil had entered, and 
caused the effectual downfall and ruin of the human race, and 
thus perpetrated nil the mischief he could, looks very much like 
•• Locking the stable-door after the horse is stolen." And the 
query also arises here, Are we not compelled to conclude that 
Moses' God was a little short-sighted, and rather hasty in his 
conclusion that every thing was so ' w very <j'>od" when the ser- 
pent proved to be so very badl The only way to escape this 
dilemma is to assume that God did not make him, and thai con- 
sequently he was not included in the original invoice of goods and 
Chattels which were pronounced ** very good; " hut, in adopting 

this expedient, we only Leap " from the frying-pan into the fire : " 
for the assumption does not do away with the difficulty, be- 
cause it i- declared that, God made every thing that was made. 



THE THBEE PLANS OF SALVATION. 339 

Hence it is evident that, if he were made at all, the God of 
Moses made him ; and, if he were not made, then it follows 
that he is a self-created or self-existent being, and invested with 
all the attributes, powers, and prerogatives of God Almighty 
himself. And thus we would place two omniscient, omnipotent, 
and omnipresent beings on the throne of the universe ; which is 
not only a moral contradiction, but a moral impossibility. We 
will assume, then, for the sake of the argument, that God did 
create the Devil, — an assumption, however, which brings us into 
still greater difficulty. Christ sa}~s, by way of illustrating 
human character, that " a tree is known by its fruit. A good 
tree can not bring forth evil fruit ; neither can a corrupt tree 
bring forth good fruit." In this case God the Creator is the 
tree, and the Devil the fruit ; and one is good, and the other 
evil. Here, then, is a good tree bearing evil fruit, which seems 
to furnish the most positive proof that Christ's moral axiom, 
61 A good tree can not bear evil fruit," is false. There is evi- 
dently something wrong somewhere in this moral picture. Either 
Christ was mistaken, or the Christian world is wrong in assum- 
ing the existence of this omnipotent and independent being of 
an opposite character. It presents us with a moral paradox 
which no theologian in Christendom has yet been able to solve. 
We are compelled to assume that both beings are good, or both 
evil, and that the}' co-operate and act in harmony ; or that a 
good God made a wicked Devil, — i.e., " a good tree brought 
forth evil fruit ; " or else we must reject the Christian system of 
salvation, and assume the existence of but one invisible and Al- 
might}' Being, who orders every thing for the best. The absurd- 
ity we have just noticed is but one of many, both of a moral and 
of a scientific nature, equally senseless and foolish, which we find 
involved in the Christian plan of salvation. We will notice a few 
others. According to Christian theolog}' and Christian logic, 
all evil or sin that is committed is prompted b}~ an evil tempter. 
Scientists and Harmonialists account for such actions by tracing 
them to the abnormal or perverted action of natural faculties, 
powers, and propensities, which, in their health}' state, are produc- 
tive of good alone, and not evil ; and thus making them the product 
of the mind itself in its unhealthy condition. But Christian 



340 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

theologians tell us it is a separate, evil genius operating in the 
4 ' inner man ' ' which does all the mischief, and prompts the 
possessor to the commission of sin. But this assumption gives 
rise to endless difficulties, some of which we will state in the 
form of questions. We would ask, then, in the first place, if 
all sin or evil is prompted by an evil tempter, how came the 
original tempter himself to fall victim to sin? Who put him up 
to it, seeing there was no tempter in existence but himself ? In 
such a dilemma, we must either assume that Divine Good- 
ness was his tempter, or that he tempted himself. To make 
him his own tempter would involve us in an egregious absurdity, 
equal to that of Guy Faux lifting himself by the straps of his 
boots ; and to make God the tempter would relieve his Satanic 
Majesty of all responsibility in the case, and make God alone 
accountable for the sin, and also the author of sin. This, how- 
ever, they do by other assumptions. Books enough have been 
written to form a library by orthodox writers in the attempt to 
rescue their God from the odium and responsibility of being the 
author of sin ; but, under their system of theology, he can not 
escape the stigma. No sensible construction of any orthodox 
S}' stem can save God from the authorship and responsibility of 
sin. They all teach that God created man, and man committed 
sin. This makes God the author of sin, either directly or indi- 
rectly, in spite of all the logic and lore that ever has been, or 
ever can be, made use of to escape the conclusion ; ibr even 
if it could be successfully shown that God did not implant in 
man the desire or inclination to commit sin, and he derived this 
inclination from the Devil, it can not be denied that God is 
responsible for allowing the Devil to exist, or, if this could be 
denied, would still be responsible for leaving man so morally 
weak as to l>e overcome by the Devil. I (' he is infinite in good- 
ness and infinite in power. as they tench, then, if he did not 

fortify man with sufficient moral strength to resist all tempta- 

i to -in. the net of sinning becomes his own. No logic and 

no ry can resist this conclusion. It is now a settled 

principle in moral ethics, that what any being does through an 

ni he does himself, and is as responsible ibr it as if he per- 
formed the act with his own hands dc facto. If, then, God 



THE THREE PLANS OF SALVATION. 341 

created the Devil, and he turned out to be the agent of evil or 
sin, it was only a roundabout and indirect mode of performing the 
act himself. This is a logical syllogism which defies the ingenu- 
it}' of the orthodox world to overturn. The most plausible plea 
in the case is, that the Devil was originally a good being, but 
fell from grace. According to several Bibles, he is a fallen 
angel ; but it is evident that he could not fall unless he pos- 
sessed some inherent moral weakness that caused him to fall. 
A perfect being could not fall. It is, then, self-evident that 
inherent moral weakness was implanted in him by his Creator. 
This would make his Creator responsible for his moral weakness, 
which caused him to fall. And thus the question is settled 
logically, philosophically, and morally. 

We will now proceed to examine the nature of the diabolical 
act which caused the downfall of the human race, — " the original 
sin," as it is called. We are told it consisted in eating some 
fruit which grew on a tree God himself had planted in the Gar- 
den of Eden, and forbidden to be used. Why it was inter- 
dicted from use is not explained in the Christian Bible ; but it is 
rendered plain b}' the relation of the same story in other Bibles. 

In the Persian version it is stated that the tree bore the 
twelve apples of immortality, and that the Devil, in the shape 
of a raonkey, guarded the tree, to prevent the genus homo 
from partaking of the fruit ; as tradition had taught them, 
that, by so doing, man would become immortal like the Gods, 
and live for ever. This the Gods deprecated, as the}' allowed 
no other beings to become equal to them, and hence had the tree 
guarded to save the immortal fruit. But the Christian Bible is 
entirely silent as to the purpose of planting the tree, or forbid- 
ding its fruit to be eaten. It cuts short mairy stories which we 
find more amplified and in fuller detail in older Bibles. No 
reflecting or unbiased mind can see any wisdom or any sense 
in permitting or causing a tree to bear fruit, and then decreeing 
that it shall all go to waste by interdicting it from being used, 
as Jehovah is represented as having done. Certainly no sensi- 
ble God would act thus. And if Adam and Eve were " very 
good," as he himself declared them to be, must we not consider 
it an ungodly and a tantalizing act to place fruit within their 



342 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

reach, and then forbid them to touch or taste it? It looks more 
like the act of a fiend than that of a kind and loving father, who, 
we would naturally suppose, would be so pleased with his newly 
made children that he would do every thing possible to please 
them and make them happy. If the fruit was an improper 
article of diet, it should have been placed out of sight, or ren- 
dered unpalatable, so that they should not desire to eat it. If 
Adam and Eve were very good beings, and God both infinitely 
good and infinitely wise, he could and should have placed them 
in a condition from which they could not fall, and in which they 
would have possessed no inclination to do any thing wrong. I 
can see no possible benefit to arise from surrounding them with 
temptations to commit an act that would ruin them eternally, 
and their posterity after them. The plea is sometimes urged 
that it was morally necessaiy for the original progenitors of the 
race to possess the power and liability to sin, in order to make 
them free agents. Free agents, indeed ! That is certainly a 
novel kind of free agency, which not only makes a man free 
to commit an act which it is known will lead to his own destruc- 
tion and the ruin of the entire human race, but implants in him 
the inclination to do it. This is free agency run mad. 

We will illustrate the principle. A mother sees her little child 
approaching an open well, and turns heedlessly away, and lets 
the child rush into the jaws of death; and, when reproved for 
the act, she raises the plea, u Oh, I did not want to interfere 
with its free agency I " Here is the Christian logic of free 
agency put in practice. God is represented as setting traps 
around the human family, knowing they will be caught ; and 
this is called moral freedom or free agency. The rat enjoys the 
Same kind of moral freedom when he creeps beneath the dead- 
fall in quesl of food, and takes the chance of misplacing the 
There is no free agency in any rational sense in fur- 
nishing a man with a rope to hang himself, knowing that it 

would be U8ed for that purpose; and this the orthodox God 

has done for the whole human family, so that we are all now 
Suspended on the gallows of total depravity and moral death. 



THE THREE PLANS OF SALVATION. 343 

The Fall and Curse. 

We will now notice some of the " awful consequences " said 
to have resulted from eating the forbidden fruit, — 4i the ■world- 
wide curse " pronounced upon the human race as the penalty for 
that act. Several distinct effects are enumerated as conse- 
quences of the deed. But a critical investigation of the matter 
in the light of the present age will show, that, instead of being 
curses, they are blessings, and have added greatly to the enjoy- 
ment and happiness of the human family ; and, consequently, 
we should now be in a more deplorable condition than we are 
if " our primitive parents " had heeded the divine interdiction, 
and let the fruit alone. We will look briefly at some of the 
consequences, and observe whether they have really turned out 
to be curses, or not. The first effect produced by the act of 
Father Adam and Mother Eve eating the forbidden fruit appears 
to have been that of opening their eyes so that they could see 
and distinguish objects around them. It certainly was a very 
singular way of cursing human beings to grant them the glorious 
boon of vision, and thus relieve them from the necessity of 
groping their way through life. As to the gift of sight being 
a curse, there are thousands of human beings now in the world 
who would like to be cursed in that way, — those who were born 
blind, or have lost their sight. " The rest of mankind " would 
consider it to be a great misfortune or curse to be placed in the 
original condition of Adam and Eve in this respect. We must 
admit, then, that this curse turned out to be a blessing, and that 
we are indebted to the serpent-devil for it ; and, consequently, 
he should not have been doomed to dine on dust as a penalty for 
conferring this blessing upon the human race. 

The second consequence growing out of the act of eating 
the interdicted fruit appears to have been the acquisition of a 
knowledge of good and evil; .that is, the power of distinguish- 
ing between good and evil. But this, so far from being a curse, 
was. an inestimable and indispensable blessing ; for, without 
the attainment of this knowledge, the}' could not have known 
that an}' act was evil, and hence would have been liable to 
plunge into all manner of crime, pillage, debaucheiy, murder, 



344 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

&c., until they effected the entire extinction of the human race. 
The acquisition, then, of the knowledge of the moral difference 
between good and evil was an invaluable blessing, and no curse 
at all ; and, having been brought about through the agency of 
the serpent-devil, he should have the credit of it. 

The third effect produced by plucking and eating the pre- 
scribed fruit was the discovery that they were naked. Why 
they had not made the discovery before is a nrystery of godli- 
ness. The people of the present age, although presumed to be 
in a state of degeneracy, if not total depravity, do not require 
the use of their eyes to know when they are naked ; but it 
seems, that, before the fall in a state of moral perfection, such 
knowledge could only be acquired through the optic nerves. 
Hence " the perfection of our first parents," so often spoken of 
and lauded b}' the orthodox world, must simply have been the per- 
fection of ignorance ; and it is true, if their history is true, that 
they were most consummately ignorant until the}' were enlightened 
b}' the serpent. They were too ignorant to clothe themselves. 
God Almighty had to forsake the throne of heaven, and come 
down to earth, to make garments of goatskins for them, before 
they could be sufficiently habilitated to go abroad, or admit 
company. Their two sons, however, were the only company 
they were permitted to enjoy at that time. And one of these 
turned out to be a murderer ; and, having killed his only brother, 
he fled to the land of Nod, and married a wife, although, ac- 
cording to the •* inspired account," his mother was the only 
woman then living. It seems strange, under such circumstances, 
that be should marry a wife when there were no women to make 
wives of. After he had killed his brother, and repented of it, 
a mark was set upon him, that "whosoever found him should 
not Blay liiiu.' ' But how could this " whosoever" know what the 
mark meant ? And who was this " whosoever," when he himself 
had killed Off the whole human race, excepting his father and 

mother? And we presume they would not be likely to slay their 
own and only son if there were no mark set upon him to prevent 

it. Dp to this period the conduct of the serpent-devil had been 
very respectful, and every act performed had resulted in a din 

benefit to the human family. Even his conduct towards Mother 



THE THREE PLANS OF SALVATION. 345 

Eye seems to have been marked by politeness ; for he served her 
with fruit before partaking of it himself. For these good acts 
he deserved the use of his legs, which, we must presume, he lost 
b} T the fall, when he transgressed, fell, and was cursed ; and 
a part of this curse consisted in taking his legs from him, and 
compelling him to crawl. But it appears his legs were after- 
wards restored to him ; for, when he came with the sons of 
God to attend a picnic at the house of Job, and was asked 
where he came from, replied, " From walking to and fro in the 
earth." This feat of walking he could not very well have per- 
formed without legs. Hence we naturally conclude they had 
grown out again, or had been restored to him in some way, not- 
withstanding it had been decreed he should " crawl on his belly 
all the days of his life." The whole story of the serpent, as pre- 
sented in Genesis, is a borrowed and laughable fiction ; and the 
reader will excuse us for presenting it in that light. 

We have shown that the violation of the command of Jehovah 
to Adam and Eve not to partake of the fruit of the tree of knowl- 
edge, so far from being attended with any evil result, gave rise 
to several important benefits, and was therefore a praiseworthy 
act. And if they had carried the act of disobedience a little 
further, and plucked and eaten of the fruit from the " tree of 
life" also, it would, according to the context, have produced 
results still more important, as it would have immortalized their 
physical bodies, and prevented the ingress of death into the 
world ; and we should have been spared that dreadful calamity. 
But a worse calamity- would have overtaken us ; for it is easily 
seen, that, in the course of a few centuries, our planet would be 
overstocked with inhabitants. And, as a part of Adam's curse 
consisted in being doomed to eat the ground (see Gen. iii. 17), 
it follows, that, if none of his posterity had died, they would have 
become so numerous in the course of time as to have eaten up 
all the ground (there being nothing else for them to eat), and 
leave not a mole-hill of terra firma for a living being to stand 
upon. The conception is really ludicrous, and } T et a legitimate 
inference from the story which presents us w^ith a series of laugh- 
able ideas from beginning to end. 

We will now notice the sentence pronounced upon the several 



346 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

participants in this fabled rebellion against the divine govern- 
ment, and observe how, or to what extent, they were realized. 
Adam, Eve, and the snake were the culprits arraigned at the 
bar under charge of being rebels ; and, all being found guilty, a 
sentence was pronounced upon each separately. We will exam- 
ine them in their order. The first part of Adam's curse con- 
sisted in being doomed to die, — " The day thou eatest thereof, 
thou shalt surely die" (Gen. ii. 17). The serpent, however, 
took the liberty to contradict and counteract the sentence, and 
told him he should not die, but that partaking of the fruit would 
make him " wise as the Gods, knowing good and evil." Now, 
the first question which arises here is, Who told the truth in the 
case, — Jehovah, or " the father of lies " ? In the eighth chapter 
of Genesis we read, " All the days of Adam were nine hundred 
and thirty years, and he begat sons and daughters." It will be 
seen, then, that he did not die in "the day thereof," nor the 
year thereof, nor the century thereof; so it appears the serpent 
told the truth, and Moses' God told the falsehood, or was mis- 
taken. Hundreds of Christian writers and commentators have 
racked their brains to find some plausible mode of disposing of 
these difficulties. The most specious one the} T have resorted 
to is that of assigning the text a spiritual signification, and 
alleging that it was a spiritual death that was intended in this 
case. But the text does not say so ; and the context shows it 
was not so: for it is declared, "Dust thou art, and unto dust 
shalt thou return" (Gen. iii. 19), which shows it was not 
spiritual but physical death that was meant; and this did not 
take place for more than nine hundred years after the sentence 
was pronounced. 

The second part of Adam's curse consisted in being driven 
out of the garden, and compelled to engage in agricultural pur- 
Suits; thai LB, he was sentenced to earn his bread by the sweat 
Of his face. (See (Jen. iii. 28). But the experience of nearly 
the whole human nice, from that period to the present time, 

proves thai the sweating part of the operation Is do curse at all, 
but a real blessing; for no person in warm climates can enjoy 

good health without perspiring occasionally; and as lor labor 
being a cur-*-, because said to have been pronounced upon 



THE THREE PLANS OF SALVATION. 347 

Adam as a penaltj T for transgression, the experience of ail who 
have tried it, and the present condition of the civilized world, 
proclaim it to be untrue. Indeed, we must consider it a very 
fortunate circumstance that he was driven out of the garden, 
and compelled to embark in agricultural pursuits, not only on 
account of such employments being conducive to health, but 
because the very existence of human life depends upon it in all 
civilized countries. It is the source whence we derive all our 
food, all our clothing, and nearly all the comforts of life. No : 
it is laziness, aot labor, that curses the race ; and the most ac- 
cursed set of beings are the drones, the soft-handed gentry, 
who are almost as afraid of a hoe, axe, or spade, as they are of 
the measles or small-pox, having been erroneously taught that 
labor is a curse. 

The third item in Adam's curse consisted in being doomed 
to eat the ground, — " Cursed is the ground for thy sake, and 
in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life " (Gen. iii. 
17) ; but we have never seen any report of either Adam or any 
of his posterity eating the ground, or making it an article of 
diet. It will be observed, then, that no part of the sentence 
pronounced upon Adam turned out to be a curse, but, when 
realized at all, was realized as a blessing. 

The sentence pronounced upon the woman was also of a 
threefold character. In the first place, she was doomed to 
" bring forth children in sorrow " (Gen. iii. 16) . And her pos- 
terity, we are told, inherited the curse, and must suffer in the 
same way ; but the history of the human family shows that 
many individuals, and whole nations in some cases, have never 
suffered this affliction. It is well known that the mothers of 
some of the African tribes, also some of the tribes of Ameri- 
cans, never suffer in childbirth. Hence it will be seen that the 
curse in the general sense implied by the text is a failure in this 
case also. 

The second punishment to which woman was to be sub- 
jected was that of being ruled over by her husband. This 
portion of her curse, we must confess, has not been an entire 
failure. Many women, even in civilized countries, are not only 
ruled over, but tyrannized over, by their husbands. Yet this 



348 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

state of things has b} 7 no means been universal. On the con- 
trary, in many cases, woman has been the ruling party ; and, in 
some instances, they have not merely ruled their own husbands, 
but all the husbands in the nation. Queen Mary, Queen Anne, 
and Queen Victoria, and many others, are examples of this kind ; 
and then there have been thousands of women in all ages and 
countries who never had any husbands. Consequently the curse 
is a failure in their cases. The curse of husband-dominion, then, 
has not fallen upon woman as a sex. 

There was to be enmity between the seed of the woman 
and the seed of the serpent (i.e., their offspring) as the third 
part of woman's curse ; but we find no evidence that this part 
of the curse has ever been fulfilled. We observe no more en- 
mity between men and serpents than between men and other 
noxious reptiles and ravenous beasts. How much enmity exists 
between the Hindoo juggler and the serpent that twines around 
his arm and neck, and crawls through his bosom? We may be 
told in reply that it is not the common serpent that is referred 
to here, but the serpent-devil that beguiled Eve ; but we do not 
learn that his Devilish Majesty ever had any offspring. So this 
part of the curse, in a general sense, is a failure also. 

The Curse of the Serpent. 

The curse pronounced upon the serpent was of a twofold 
character. 

He was doomed to crawl upon his bel^. How he traveled 
previous to that period we have no means of knowing, as reve- 
lation is silent on this momentous subject. He must have 
crawled on his back, or hopped on his head or tail, — either of 
which we should consider a much more difficult mode of travel- 
ing than that indicted on him by the curse. I can sec 1 no curse 
or punishment in an animal or reptile traveling in its natural 
way, and by the easiest mode known in the whole animal king- 
dom. To make 8 curse of his mode of travel, lie should have 
been turned the other side up, so that, while wiggling or wrig- 
gling along on his back, his eves and mouth would get full of 
dust and mud. This would have been much more like a pun- 
ishment. — a more real and sensible curse than his present mode 
of traveling. 



THE TIIREE PLANS OF SALVATION. 349 

The second mode of punishing the serpent was to compel 
him to eat dust as an article of diet ; but some difficulty must 
have arisen in attempting to comply with the injunction. When 
the ground is saturated with water, he would have to take a 
meal occasionally of mud, which would not be more nutritious 
than dust, and would not be fulfilling the law. But it is need- 
less to speculate. It is evident he does not subsist in that way, 
but, like the other culprits, escaped the penalties or punishments 
due to his crime. 

I have now examined all the items of the curse — eight in 
number — said to have been visited upon Adam, Eve, and the 
serpent ; and what do they all amount to ? Not one of them has 
been realized as such ; but most of those which were practically 
realized turned out to be real blessings. And yet they have 
been proclaimed to the world by the clergy as the missiles of 
wrath hurled upon a guilty world for the sin of rebellion against 
the divine government ; and, whether any of these so-called 
"visitations of divine displeasure" were designed as penalties 
for disobedience or not, it is evident they have not in a moral 
sense been realized, or had any beneficial effect whatever. And 
we must conclude that it was rather short-sighted in Moses' 
God to attempt to bring his children into obedience by pro- 
nouncing curses upon them. He himself virtually acknowledges 
it ; for, after having tried these expedients and found they availed 
nothing, he became so discouraged, that he said, "It grieved 
him to the heart " (see Gen. vi. 6) that he had made so rebel- 
lious a creature as man. 

The Second Scheme of Redemption. 

The God of Moses, after having tried the expedient of curs- 
ing his children, — the cunning workmanship of his hands, — and 
grieved over the failure for more than a thousand years, — he 
(the God of Moses) came to the conclusion to try another ex- 
pedient. He concluded to select a few of the choicest speci- 
mens of the genus Jiomo, in order to preserve the race, and start 
anew with some of the best stock or material that could be 
found. Accordingly, old drunken Noah — the most righteous 
man that could be found amongst the millions of the inhabit- 



350 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

ants of the globe — was chosen to build a schooner, yacht, 
canoe, or some kind of a vessel, called an ark, into which he 
stowed millions of birds, bipeds, and insects of all species 
and all sizes, from the ostrich and condor down to fleas, flies, 
mosquitoes, spiders, and bed-bugs ; and millions of animals 
and reptiles of all kinds and all sizes, from the mammoth and 
the mastodon down to skunks, lizards, snakes, gophers, and 
grasshoppers; together with himself and family of eight persons, 
and food sufficient to last them ten months while in the ark, 
and several years afterwards, as we must presume was done 
from the fact that it is declared that the waters destroyed every 
living thing upon the face of the earth. And it must have re- 
quired several 3'ears to restock it with grass and animals to 
serve as food for the granivorous, herbivorous, and carnivo- 
rous species ; and this would make a bulk sufficient to fill forty 
such vessels, and a weight sufficient to sink the whole British 
navy. And all this living mass of respiring and perspiring 
animals were dependent upon one little window twelve inches 
b}' fifteen for light and air, and which had to be kept shut most 
of the time to keep out the rain. If some giraffe or cameleo- 
pard had been disposed to monopolize the window by thrusting 
his head out, we can easily imagine what would have been the 
fatal consequence to this living, breathing cargo. And then 
we have to entertain the thought that lions and lambs, wolves 
and sheep, dogs and skunks, hawks and chickens, owls and 
doves. c;its and mice, men and monkeys, all ate and slept to- 
gether Inimmediate juxtaposition like a band of brothers. Per- 
haps more glorious times never were realized since "the sons 
of God shouted for joy." But it appears the whole thing 
turned out to be a failure. The drowning process was no more 
effectual in producing the desired reformation than the first 
scheme thai had been tried ; for, only a few hundred years after 
the culmination of this world-drowning experiment, Moses' God 
is represented as crying out Ln despair, " The imagination of 
man's bear! is evil, and only evil continually." This was cer- 
tainly a deplorable and disheartening state of things witnessed 

1000 after it had been presumed thai all the bad folks had 
been drowned; but it appears, that, if all that class had been 



THE THREE PLANS OF SALVATION. 351 

drowned, there would have been no human beings left. David, 
therefore, was probably right when he exclaims, " There is none 
that doeth good, no not one " (Ps. xiv. 3). 

The Third and Last Plan of Salvation. 

The atonement was the third and last resort. The third 
experiment in any case generally ends the siege whether suc- 
cessful or unsuccessful. After a few thousand years more had 
elapsed of grief, anger, and disappointment in the practical 
history of Moses' God, he ventured to try one more experiment 
in the effort to get his people in the right track, — not so much, 
however, to get them in the right way, as to have his own 
wrath appeased. In this way he sanctions the greatest crime 
ever perpetrated by the hand of man, — that of murder. God 
the "Father,' in order to cancel the sins of his disobedient 
and rebellious children, and mitigate his own wrath, is repre- 
sented as proposing to have his " only-begotten son " killed, — 
at least, as consenting to the act. This looks like "doing evil 
that good may come of it ; " which is a very objectionable prin- 
ciple of moral ethics, according to Paul. How the commission 
of the greatest of all sins can do anj thing towards reforming 
other sins, or how the punishment of an innocent being can do 
any thing towards atoning for the sins of the guilty, presents 
us with a moral problem, shocking both to our common sense 
and common reason. If the Father's anger could not be ap- 
peased or his vengeance satisfied without the perpetration of a 
horrible murder, and the knowledge that some victim had died 
a slow and agonizing death, we are forced to the conclusion 
that he is a cruel and revengeful God, and that his passions 
overrule his love of justice and his paternal regard for his son. 
But it appears that this last experiment, whether right or wrong, 
was attended with as complete a failure as the two preceding 
ones ; and yet it assumes to be the best that "Infinite Wisdom " 
could devise. And the resources of divine knowledge and skill 
were apparently exhausted when this scheme culminated. And 
yet it also failed, according to the admission of its own friends 
and ardent supporters (the clergy) ; for they tell us, that, not- 
withstanding all the schemes and systems that Omniscience and 



352 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Infinite Prescience could devise to save man, he does not get 
saved : at least but few are saved, and they have to u work out 
their own salvation with fear and trembling." Nineteen-twen- 
tieths of the human family, the clergy tell us, are still traveling 
" the broad road," and are finally lost, notwithstanding all the 
labored experiments and expedients of omniscient or Jehovah- 
istic wisdom to save them. With this view of the case, the 
thought is suggested that it was hardly worth while to have 
gone to the trouble and expense of fitting up a heaven for the 
few that are saved. It certainly u doesn't pay." And this con- 
clusion is the more forcible in view of the fact that it must be 
rather a lonesome place, and consequently not a very desirable 
home or situation to live in ; for we are told it is ' L a house of 
many mansions," " and yet few there be that find the strait 
and narrow road " leading to it. Hence we may conclude that 
man}' of the rooms or mansions are empty. Such a lonesome 
heaven could not be congenial or adapted to any class of saints 
but monks and hermits. 

We have now briefly examined the three plans of salvation 
which lie at the foundation of the Christian religion, and 
shown that they are all failures according to their own wit- 
nesses. In view of this fact, we can not wonder that Moses' 
God is represented as saying that he repented for having made 
man, and that it grieved him to the heart (Gen. vi. G). Such 
a series of signal failures is enough to discourage even a saint 
or a God. 



CHAPTER LIV. 
THE TRUE RELIGION. 



Timf. religio God In every tiling, reads his scriptures 

on every page of Nature's open Bible, and feels him in the In- 
spiration of the soul. It culls God father, not king; Christ a 
brother, not b redeemer. It loves all men, but fears no God. 

Its God is not a tyrant, but a loving lather. It looks upon 



THE TRUE RELIGION. 353 

Jesus Christ as a truly good man, but not a Gocl ; as a noble, 
loving, benevolent being, but endowed with human frailties. It 
considers him a martyr to truth and right, but not a just victim 
to his father's wrath, or the just object of a blood}' sacrifice. 
It regards the laws of nature as sufficient, if diligently studied 
and strictly observed, to serve as a guide for man's earthly life 
without any special revelation. It holds that man's natural 
love of goodness, justice, mercy, and honesty is capable of 
endless expansion and augmentation. [Vu walks by the light of 
science"^ The many grand truths of the age, developed by the 
onward march of mind, form its infallible laws, and constitute 
its living virtues. \Jt uses reason for a lamp, and an enlightened 
intellect for a guideN It ties no martyr to the stake, piles the 
faggots around no heretics. It issues no dogmas, no bulls, no 
canons, andlhangs man's salvation upon no infallible revelation^ 
Christians say, Give us a better revelation ; Christ said, " Cease 
to do evil, and [then] learn to do well." All wrong and hurtful 
institutions should be pulled down or abandoned, and trust to 
finding better ones. $ Remove the weeds from the soil, and a 
healthy and useful vegetation will spring up in their place .) The 
true religion grants perfect freedom to all human beings ; leaves 
human thought as free and unfettered as the wind, as free as 
the rays of sunlight which fall upon ever}^ hill and every valley, 
and rest upon the bosom of the deep. 

True religion does not regard God as a personal monarch, 
governing the universe by the caprices of an angry and fickle 
mind, but as the living, moving, all-pervading, self-sustaining, 
energizing, vivifying power which moves and sustains the ma- 
chinery of the whole universe, and controls, by a concatenation 
of laws, the myriads of worlds which move in majestic grandeur 
through infinite space, and causes them to act in concert and 
harmony without a discordant jar. It does not write its in- 
spiration and revelation in a dead language or unintelligible 
Hebrew, but in living characters, which all can read and un- 
derstand. It indulges in no spirit of bigotry, consigns no man 
or woman to endless torment, never talks of total depravity or 
original sin. It is a natural and godlike religion, calculated to 
satisfy the deep, unutterable longings of the soul, and bring 



354 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

blessings and happiness to all who live up to its requirements. 
It is a tree bearing the fruit of practical righteousness. It does 
not teach that all of God's truth is shut up in a printed book. 
It knows no sects, no creeds, and no thirty-nine articles. It 
does not pilot the pilgrim through life with a dark lantern, nor 
search for living truths among the religious mummies of the 
dark ages, but regales itself upon the living truths of the age. 
Its devotees do not require temples made with hands in which 
to worship the Father. It does not require holy houses, holy 
days, or holy sacraments. It recommends all to search for 
truth as a pearl of great price. It teaches all to worship God 
by a life of practical goodness, and by cherishing kindly feel- 
ings toward every human being. This is a religion that will 
impart true pleasure in life, and afford sure comfort in a d}ing 
hour. 

The Religion for this Age 

Is a religion founded upon truth and goodness, — a religion 
freed from the old, worn-out, superstitious, Oriental myths. 
The people are becoming too enlightened] to tolerate them much 
longer ; they are becoming tired of being fed on the stale food 
of past ages ; they have been kept in a state of spiritual stagna- 
tion long enough. They are becoming too intelligent to wish 
to listen to old nrythologial doctrines which have been preached 
by Christians for centuries. ^Ye want a religion better adapted 
to the wants of the age. We want a religion that will furnish 
better nourishment for man's moral and spiritual nature, — a 
religion ealeulaled to develop true manhood, instead of repress- 
ing it : a religion whose doctrines do not conflict with estab- 
lished principles of science ; a religion which our moral sense 
dO£8 n«>t condemn, and against which our reason will not 
rebel. We want a religion that builds no walls between reason 
and revelation, and forms no creeds and no barriers to the 
spontaneous Outgrowth of every faculty of the soul. W« want 
a religion that does not require men and women to be born 
B6V6r*] times before they can be honest, truthful, and reliable, 
or ■• gOQd enough to enter the kingdom of heaven. M We want 
a religion which acknowledges no law but truth and justice, — 



THE TRUE RELIGION. 355 

a religion that will tolerate no wrong, and forgive no sin. We 
want a religion whose bond is love, whose temple is truth, and 
whose altar is a guiltless conscience, and whose creed is a 
life of practical righteousness. We want a religion which will 
teach us to cherish kindty feelings toward all mankind, and 
which will prompt us to labor to spread flowers instead of 
thorns in the pathway of every one with whom we come in con- 
tact, and thus make them better and happier beings ; for this 
is the true end of all true religion and all true preaching. 

"For modes of faith let zealous bigots fight: 
He can't be wrong whose life is in the right. " 

We want a religion which will estimate men and women for 
what they are, and not for what they believe, — a religion that 
does not measure their moral worth by their creeds, but b} r their 
practical lives. We want a religion that will banish all creeds 
and mind-enslaving dogmas from the earth, and substitute in 
their place brotherly love and goodness. We want a religion 
that will do away with ignorance and poverty, that will labor to 
prevent any one from suffering for the needful things of life, and 
that will bind all together in the ties of universal brotherhood. 
In fine, we want a religion which will make truth and love and 
true practical righteousness the pole-star of every man and 
woman who embrace it. This is the religion we need ; this is 
the religion for the age ; this is the religion that would and 
will banish all unrighteousness from the earth, and elevate the 
race to a higher plane than they ever have or ever can attain 
under their soul- cramping, creed-bound religions ; this is the 
religion the author is laboring for, and has earnestly desired 
for twenty-three years to see established among "all nations, 
tongues, kindred, and people." This religion is not derived 
from any Bible, but is an outgrowth of man's moral and reli- 
gious nature, as all true religions in all countries have been. 
A religion derived from this source would prompt us to labor 
claity to promote the happiness of our neighbors and fellow- 
beings generally, ^instead of studying every hour of our lives 
to practically rob them, as do most men in civilized countries, 
including nearly all Christian professors A who are positively for- 



356 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

bidden b} T their Bible and lawgiver (Christ) to lay up any treas- 
ure on earth ; yet it is their constant study how to draw all the 
money possible out of the pockets of their neighbors, with but 
little regard to their wants, necessities, or even sufferings, that 
they may die in the midst of wealtli^) It is a strange, yet 
almost universal, infatuation, that the inauguration of the true 
religion will banish from the earth. 



CHAPTER LV. 

"ALL SCRIPTURE IS GIVEN BY INSPIRATION OF GOD." 

If this statement be true, then God must have " led a very 
busy life ; ' ' for the world is literally loaded down with scrip- 
tures. There are not less than eleven hundred and fift}' pious 
effusions that may come under this head, and at least that num- 
ber claiming to have originated from the fountain of divine in- 
spiration ; but the religious sects and religious orders will tell 
us that but one of those eleven hundred and fifty scriptures 
is the product of the Divine Mind, and but one of them has 
received the seal and sanction of Almight} T God. Then our sal- 
vation hangs by a very slender thread ; for no rule has been fur- 
nished us by Infinite Wisdom by which we can distinguish which 
is the spurious and which the genuine, or which is the scripture 
given by inspiration of God. All pious nations have had their 
scriptures ill profusion. Let us hold a court, and hear the testi- 
mony of some of the witnesses with respect to the validity of 
their respective claims. Here is a Hindoo, a pious soul of the 
Brahmin order. Well, brother, we wish you to tell us whether 
you know any thing about c * the scriptures given by inspiration 
Of God." — "Most certainly I do." Well, where mid what 
arc they? •" Why. after existing in the mind of the great God 

Brahma from nil eternity, they were revealed by him. about 

nine thousand years ago, to the holy richis (prophets), who 

penned them into a Holy Book for the instruction and salvation 
of the world, now known as the Yedas. They are pure, holy, 



ALL SCBIPTUBE GIVEN BY INSPIBATION OF GOD. 357 

and divine, and point out the only sure road to salvation." 
Here comes a Chinese mandarin. Well, brother, what light 
can }T>u throw upon this subject? Have you ever seen " the 
scriptures given by inspiration of God " ? " That is a question 
easily answered. The Five Volumes are the purest, the holiest, 
and the most sublime production ever given to the world. 
There is nothing immoral, no obscene language, to be found in 
this ' Hoty Book.' Its precepts are matchless; and it is the 
only book whose teachings are calculated to ' make wise unto 
salvation. ' It will save all men who receive it, and obey it/' 
Take a seat : we want now to hear from a disciple representing 
the land of Iran. Brother Persian, the question is, Where is 
c ' the scripture given by inspiration of God " ? " Your ques- 
tion surprises me. The Holy Zenda Avesta has been circu- 
lating for thousands of years ; and have you not seen it ? 
It points out the only sure road to the kingdom of eternal bliss, 
and contains the only true religion for the human race." Very 
well : be seated. There is yet another class of devout wor- 
shipers we wish to interrogate on this all-important subject. 
Brother Mahomedan, will you please to step forward, and help 
us solve this difficult problem ? Where are ' c the scriptures 
given by inspiration of God " ? *' Have }^ou never read that 
holy and inspired book, the Koran? If so, you ought to be 
able to answer the question ; and, if not, jou are risking your 
eternal salvation hj remaining ignorant of its beautiful truths : 
for it consigns to an endless fiery hell all who disbelieve and 
reject its sublime teachings, and refuse to travel the road it has 
marked out to paradise and eternal bliss." Thus we are mak- 
ing but little progress toward settling the question, Where is 
' ' the scripture given b} r inspiration of God ' ' ? We will now 
question the Christian Church. Here we are met at the very 
threshold with two hundred answers. "Join our church, and 
beware of counterfeits," meets us at every church-door. We do 
not mean to say that every church has a separate Bible, though 
virtually it almost amounts to this, as each denies to all others 
that use of the Bible and construction of its doctrine and teach- 
ings which alone can insure salvation. But, in a broader sense, 
there are two hundred answers to the question, Where are we 



358 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

to find "the only scriptures given by inspiration of God"? 
The two hundred translators and four hundred commentators 
make out more than two hundred distinct systems of faith, and 
virtually more than two hundred Bibles. When we look at the 
numerous and widely different translations of the Bible, and the 
numerous collection of books by different churches which have 
been made to constitute the Bible at different periods, and the 
numerous alterations which Christian waiters tell us have been 
made in all of the books of the Bible, and the great number of 
gospels and epistles floating over the world at one period and 
afterwards denounced as spurious, and the constant alteration 
of the Bible by adding some books and rejecting others, we 
can see at once that it is impossible ever to find any way of 
determining which are 4 ' the scriptures given by inspiration of 
God." Here let it be noted, that, for nearly three hundred 
years, the Christian world had no Bible but the Old Testament, 
and that, during that period, hundreds of gospels and epistles 
were written, and thirty-six Acts of the Apostles, by all kinds 
of scribblers, or, as one Christian writer calls them, "ignorant 
asses." These were put in circulation as constituting "the 
only scriptures given by inspiration of God." Most of them 
were afterwards condemned by the Church fathers as being the 
product of the Devil, and as being calculated to lead every soul 
down to hell who should read and believe them. But there 
never was any agreement among church-leaders as to which of 
the three hundred gospels and epistles in circulation were spu- 
rious, and which were genuine; nor has there ever been any 
rule for distinguishing them, or determining which was which. 
How. then, was it possible to know which were ww the scriptures 
given by inspiration of God"? Here arises a query of most 
Striking import, which should sink deep into the mind of every 
honest investigator of this subject, Should it not be set down 
as a moral Impossibility that an all-wise God would inspire men 
to write gospels and epistles for the instruction of mankind mid 
the salvation of the world, and then let them gel mixed up with 
hundreds of others " inspired by the Devil," and calculated to 

•• Lead t<> perdition M ? It must have been the means of effecting 
the eternal ruin of thousands, if not millions, of immortal souls. 



ALL SCRIPTURE GIVEN BY INSPIRATION OF GOD. 359 

And nearly all Christian writers admit there was no wa} T of dis- 
tinguishing the poisonous and pernicious productions from the 
" inspired." It is also admitted that the former were more read 
than the latter. Now, we must assume that a God would be 
essentially lacking in the ingredients of good sense (or rather 
would be a mere imaginary being) who would do business in 
such a bungling and reckless manner as to furnish man with a 
revelation of his will, hang his salvation upon it, and then aban- 
don the field for three hundred years, and let every thing run to 
ruin. Such a God ought to " repent, and be grieved to the heart." 
Look what kind of stuff the people swallowed for gospel during 
that period ! The Gospel of the Infancy, which was afterwards 
condemned as the work of devils and impostors, was, during this 
period, accepted as inspired by nearly the whole Christian world ; 
and see what it contains. In the first chapter it is related that 
a woman had a son who was, by the intervention of some witches, 
turned into an ass, when she hastened off to the mother of the 
young Messiah (Jesus) , and related her grievance to that ami- 
able personage, which so excited her compassion that she forth- 
with seized the young child Jesus, and set him astride the ass's 
neck, when, " lo and behold ! " it took all the ass properties out 
of the animal, and restored him back to manhood, or rather bo}^- 
hood. And all the biped asses then in Christendom swallowed 
this assinine story as " scripture given by inspiration of God." 
The same book relates that various sick and impotent persons 
visited the child Jesus, and were cured of their diseases by hav- 
ing his swaddling-clothes wrapped about their heads, necks, or 
other portions of the body, and forthwith the devils departed 
(on one occasion in the shape of a dog) . If there is a lower 
plane of senseless superstition than this, I pray God I may 
never know it. And all this was gospel and " inspired scrip- 
ture," for whole centuries, with the majority of Christendom. 
Both preachers and laymen read and believed those ' ' Holy 
Scriptures." This is about as senseless as the story of some 
devils coming out of a woman, and taking up their abode in 
a herd of swine. These stories are all "chips of the same 
block," and all equally incredible. 



3G0 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Character of the Voters who decided what Scriptures 
should be considered inspired. 

It is now well known that the first authentic collection of Gos- 
pels and Epistles, called " the Bible," was made by the Council 
of Nice 325 A.D., — a body of drunken bishops and lawless 
bacchanalians. The Christian writer, Mr. Tynclal, g&ji they 
got drunk, came to blows, and kicked and cuffed each other ; 
and that ' ; the love of contention and ambition overcame their 
reason." They claimed to be under the influence of " the 
spirit." Undoubtedly they were; but it was a kind of spirit 
that men hold intercourse with by uncorking the bottle, and not 
the spirit of gentleness and peace. He says, u They fell afoul 
of each other ; " and such was the severity of their blows, that 
one member was mortally wounded, and died a short time after. 
It was simply a disgusting and disgraceful row, — a scene of 
rowdyism of at first seventeen hundred, and finally about three 
hundred, Christian bishops, without a character for either virtue, 
sobriety, or honest}-. One writer says, " The} r were abandoned 
to every species of immorality, and addicted to the most abom- 
inable crimes;" and such was their extreme ignorance, that 
but few of them could write their names. Their method of de- 
ciding which Gospels and Epistles were divinely inspired was 
quite unique. It is stated they were all placed under the com- 
munion-table : and, when the proper signal was given (so says 
Iremeus), the inspired Gospels "hopped on to the table," which 
separated them from the spurious. Why the spurious Gospels 
did not po-se>s the hopping power and propensity is not stated. 
Two of the bishops, Chrysante and Musanius, died during the 
council, before the vote w«a taken; but sueh was the impor- 
tanee of the occasion, that they did not withhold their votes on 
that account. The proper documents being prepared and car- 
1 and placed near their defunct bodies, they mils. -red all the 
force their dead bodies could command, and signed them; and 
thus, between the living and the dead, we have got a Bible 
which, it is presumed, contains all " the scripture given by in- 
spiration of God M under the new dispensation. The (iospcls 
and Epistles thus voted into favor were not arranged together 



ALL SCRIPTURE GIVEN BY INSPIRATION OF GOD. 361 

in the form of an authentic Bible until nearly sixty years after. 
This was clone by the Council of Laoclicea in the year 363. 
After this, council after council was called to vote in or vote 
out some of the books adopted by previous councils, and to 
settle some important church dogmas. The first council voted 
the Acts of the Apostles and Revelation out of the Bible (i.e., 
voted them down) ; but the second council, which met in 363, 
voted them in again. Another council, which met in 406, voted 
them, with several other books, out of the Bible again. And 
thus were books and dogmas voted in and voted out of c ' the 
infallible and inspired word of God," and altered and corrected, 
time after time and century after century, by twenty-four differ- 
ent councils, composed of bigoted bishops and clergymen, so 
quarrelsome and belligerent that they resorted to fisticuff fight- 
ing in several of the councils; and thus was "God's Holy 
Word " and " perfect revelation " tossed to and fro like a bat- 
tledore, — this book voted in, and that one voted out, and 
sometimes half a dozen at a time. And where was the " all 
scripture given by inspiration of God ' ' at the end of this revo- 
lutionary and demolishing clerical crusade? And where was 
its author, that he would suffer the whole thing to be taken out 
of his hands, altered and corrupted till he could not know his 
own book, and would not have been willing to father it if he 
had been able to recognize it? William Penn says, that " some 
of the scriptures which were taken in by one council as inspired 
were rejected by another council as uninspired ; and that which 
was left out by the former council as apocryphal was taken in 
by the latter as canonical. And certain it is that they contra- 
dict each other. And how do we know that the council which 
first collected and voted on the scriptures — voting some up, 
and some down — were able to discern the true from the false ? " 
Here the whole thing is set in its proper light by a devout 
Quaker preacher. The extract contains a volume of instruc- 
tion, and shows the impossibility of our determining the "all 
scripture given by inspiration of God." 

Additions, Alterations, and Interpolations. 
We have a vast amount of testimony to prove that councils, 



362 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

churches, and clerg}~men arrogated to themselves a lawless 
license to change, insert, and leave out various texts, chapters, 
and even whole books, from "God's unchangeable word," till 
it may now be assumed to be thoroughly changed. From a 
large volume of testimonies we will cite a few : The version of 
the Old Testament made under Ptolemy Philadelphus, 287 
B.C., — the most reliable version extant, — Bishop Usher pro- 
nounces a spurious copy, full of interpolations, additions, and 
alterations. He says, u The translators of the Septuagint 
added to, and took from, and changed at pleasure ; " and St. 
Jerome says that Origen did the same thing with the New 
Testament. Bishop Marsh testifies, in like manner, that Ori- 
gen, who first collected the Bible books together, confessed that 
he made many alterations in them before they fell into the 
hands of the Council of Nice. Dr. Bentle}' admits that the 
best copy of the New Testament contains hundreds of irrepar- 
able omissions, errors, and mistakes. The Rev. Dr. Whitby 
says, " Many corruptions and interpolations were made almost 
in the apostolic age." Dupin says, "Several authors took the 
libert}' to add, retrench, correct divers things." Some of the 
clergy and churches rejected books which did not suit them, 
while others altered them to suit their fancy. We are told that 
Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury, made countless numbers 
of alterations in the Bible in the sixth centuiy for the purpose 
of making them suit his Church. Eusebius says he found so 
much proof that the Gospel of Matthew had been altered and 
corrupted, that he rejected it as being unworthy of confidence. 
Victor Wilson informs us that a genera] alteration of the Gos- 
pels took place at Constantinople in the year 506 by order of 
the Emperor Anastasius. St. Jerome complains that in his 
time many alterations had been made in the Bible, and that its 
different translations were so essentially changed that wb no one 
copy or translation resembled another. " Scaliger testifies that 
the clergy and the churches put into their scriptures what- 

r they thought would serve their purpose. Michaclis s:: 
" They thrust in and thrust out as best suits fancy." In the 

name of (iod. we would ask how any person in his sober reason 
can think of finding kw all seriptnre given by inspiration of 



ALL SCRIPTURE GIVEN BY INSPIRATION OF GOD. 363 

God " in the midst of such a general wreck, ruin, and demoli- 
tion of the original scriptures. It is as impossible as to raise 
the dead or to find Charlie Ross. The Rev. Dr. Gregory says 
that no profane author has suffered like the Bible by profane 
hands. Where, then, can we find " all scripture given by inspi- 
ration of God"? 

Forged Gospels and Epistles. 

The Unitarian Bible says, in its preface, " It is notorious that 
forged writings, under the name of the apostles, were in circula- 
tion almost from the apostolic age." Mosheim testifies that 
" several histories of Christ's life and doctrines, full of pious 
frauds and fabulous wonders, were put in circulation before the 
meeting of the Council of Nice ; " and he states, like William 
Penn, that he had no confidence in their ability to distinguish 
the true" from the false. We will here quote another statement 
of William Penn : " There are many errors in the Bible. The 
learned know it : the unlearned had better not know it." Here 
is another sad proof of the blinding effect of reading and believ- 
ing a book which abounds in errors. He would have the un- 
learned and honest reader swallow all the errors of the Bible, 
and be thereby morally poisoned by them, rather than have the 
book brought into discredit by having its errors exposed. This 
circumstance of itself is sufficient to seal its condemnation. 
Belsham says, " The genuine books of the Bible were but few 
compared with the spurious ones," This would be inferred 
from the circumstance of only four Gospels being adopted out 
of fifty, and only seventeen Epistles out of more than one 
hundred. Daille says, " The Christian fathers forged whole 
books ; ' ' but neither he nor anybody else can furnish any rule 
for determining which they are. 

Lost Books Found or Re-written. 
Dupin says a portion of the books of the Old Testament 
were burned in wars, and others lost by the Jews themselves ; 
and in the Second Book of Chronicles (xxxiv. 14) we are told 
that Hilkiah found the Book of the Law after it had been lost 
eight hundred years. This law appears to have constituted the 



364 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

most important portion of the Jewish sacred writings. The 
circumstance gives rise to some very strange reflections and 
conclusions. It appears from this circumstance that the Lord's 
holy people had been without any law to guide or govern them 
for eight long centuries. Now, can we suppose for a moment 
that their God, Jehovah, was a being of infinite wisdom to 
write or dictate a law, and base the happiness and welfare of his 
people if not the world on that law, and then, through care- 
lessness or otherwise, suffer it to get lost, and remain unfound 
for eight hundred years, so that nobody could have the benefit 
of it during that long period ? The very thought is a trespass 
upon our good sense, and does violence to our reason. And 
where was the law during all that time ? and how was it pre- 
served for so long a period of time ? If written on papyrus or 
parchment, it would have perished in less than a century from 
being exposed to the weather : for we can't assume it was pre- 
served in a drawer or box, as, in that case, it would not have 
been lost ; and, if engraven on stone, the weight would have been 
fifty times as much as Hilkiah could carry. We are told that 
when Josiah the king heard the law read, he rent his clothes 
(2 Chron: xxxiv. 19). 

Well, that is strange indeed. It must have been a very 
curious law, or he must have been a very curious man. Why 
the reading of a few plain moral precepts should drive a man 
to insanity, and cause him to tear his clothes, is something hard 
to understand. And it is evidence that the whole Jewish tribe 
had never known or read much about the law : otherwise a 
knowledge of it would have been preserved by tradition, and 
the king would not have been so profoundly ignorant of it. If 
the law was the Pentateuch, as some writers assume, the king 
would have had to stand a week to hear it all read ; and it 
ins Btrange thai •* Shaphan the scribe " could pick up a doc- 
ument covered with the mold, rust, and dust of eight centuries, 
and read it off With sufficient expertness for the king to listen 

to with patience. But the wonder and difficulty don't stop 
here. It was only about a quarter of a century until this great 
••holy and divine law n was lost again; which left " the Lord's 
holy people" again without any moral code to guide them, or 



All SCBIPTUBE GIVEN BY INSPIBATION OF GOD. 365 

a governing law, for six centuries longer. No wonder they 
preferred worshiping a calf (see Exod. xxxii.) to paying hom- 
age to a God so reckless of their welfare and happiness. On 
this occasion it became so thoroughly lost, that it never " turned 
up ' ' again ; and there seemed to be no way to remedy the de- 
plorable loss but to have it written over again. At least that 
appears to have been the impression of Ezra the priest, who 
set himself to the onerous task of reproducing the long-lost 
document from memory or from a second installment of divine 
inspiration. (See Esdras.) Such a memory does not often fall 
to the lot of mortals to possess, — a memory that could enable 
a man to reproduce a document which neither he nor an}' other 
person had read for six hundred years. Jf the world could be 
furnished with such a mental prodigy at the present da}', we 
might again have the benefit of the numerous books and libra- 
ries which have been destroyed by fire in modern times. It 
would require no previous knowledge of any of those works to 
achieve the task of reproducing them. Perhaps we may be told 
that we are becoming " wise above what is written." It would 
require no mental effort to attain to this eminence, and become 
obnoxious to such a charge. In this case, a few brief sen- 
tences, and the whole thing is dismissed : no details are given. 
The story of Hilkiah finding the Book of the Law sounds very 
much like Joe Smith finding the Mormon Bible ; and the case 
of Ezra's re- writing it is matched by the story of " Vyass the 
Holy ' ' finding the divine law of the Brahmins some three thou- 
sand years before Hilkiah was born. Mr. Higgins says that 
nearly all ancient religious nations had the tradition of losing 
and finding their holy books, holy laws, and holy languages. 
The query is here suggested, that if such an important docu- 
ment could be restored to the people in the manner adopted by 
Ezra, why was not this expedient resorted to a thousand years 
sooner, and thus save the demoralization of the Jews? The 
policy adopted is too much like ' c locking the stall after the 
horse is stolen." 

Impossibility of possessing a Reliable Translation. 
It is quite evident, from the facts presented and from others 



366 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

which will hereafter be presented, that, if God ever gave forth 
a revelation of his will to the founders of the Jewish and Chris- 
tian religions, the world is not in possession of it now, and 
can not find it in a book as old as the Christian Bible, and 
written by simply stringing consonants together in a line without 
an}' vowels, and without an}- distinction of words, and which 
must necessarily be an enigma that would puzzle any scholar 
to decipher. Hence the learned Le Clere says, "Even the 
learned guess at the sense in an infinity of places, which has 
produced a prodigious number of discordant interpretations." 
And Simonton, in his " Critical History," says, " It is unques- 
tionable that the greater part of the Hebrew words of the Old 
Testament are equivocal in their signification, and utterly uncer- 
tain ; and that even the most learned Jews doubt almost every 
thing in regard to their proper meaning." To talk of finding 
c ' all scripture given by inspiration of God ' ' environed with such 
difficulties, is to talk nonsense. We will illustrate the nature of 
these difficulties by citing a case. We will look at the random 
guessing at the meaning of a single word of a single text by the 
most learned students and scholars in biblical literature. The 
word indicating the material of which Noah's ark was com- 
posed, our translation says, was gophir-wood : but the Arabic 
translation says it was box-wood ; the Persian translation says 
it was pine-.wood ; another translation makes it red ebony ; and 
still another declares it was wicker-work 1 ; Davidson, assuming 
to be '-wise above what is written" in the case, says it was 
bulrushes cemented with pitch; another writer translates it 
cedar-wood, &c. And thus God's Holy Book, designed for the 
guidance of man, has been the sport and the bauble of learned 
guessers in all ages of Christendom, who evidently know as 
much about it, in many eases, as a goose does about Greek. 

Many Diitkkknt CHRISTIAN BtBLES. 

Owing to the multiplicity of Bibfe translations, which differ 
widely in their doctrines, precepts, and the relation of genera) 
events, making a different collection of bpoks to constitute 

"the \v<»id of God," various churches, and even individual 

pTOt unied the liberty to compile and make a 



ALL SCRIPTURE GIVEN BY INSPIRATION OF GOB, 367 

Bible for themselves. The Roman-Catholic Bible differs essen- 
tially from that of the Protestants', having fourteen more books. 
The Bible of the Greek Church differs from both. The Camp- 
bellites have a translation of their own. The Samaritan Bible 
contains only the Five Books of Moses. The Unitarians, having 
found twenty-four thousand errors in the popular translation, 
made another translation containing still many thousand errors. 
The American Christian Union, having found many thousand 
errors in King James's translation, are now engaged in a new 
translation. How many more we are to have, God only knows. 
Martin Luther condemned eleven books of the Bible, as we 
have already stated, and thus made a Bible for himself. Paul's 
Epistle to the Hebrews he denounced in strong terms. Eu- 
sebius, the learned ecclesiastical writer, throws eight Bible- 
books overboard, and had a Bible to his own fancy. Dr. Lard- 
ner and John Calvin each condemned five or six books, and had 
a Bible peculiar to themselves. Grotius places the heel of con- 
demnation on several books of the Bible. Bishop Baxter voted 
down eight books as uninspired, and unworthy of confidence. 
Swedenborg accepted only the Four Gospels and Revelation as 
inspired. The German fathers rejected the Gospel of St. Mat- 
thew, and I know not how many other books. The Bible of the 
learned Christian writer Evanson did not contain either Mat- 
thew, Mark, or John. The Unitarian Bible does not contain 
Hebrews, James, Jucle, or Revelation. The Catholics de- 
nounce the Protestant Bible, and the Protestants condemn the 
Catholic Bible, as being full of errors. A number of other 
churches and learned Christians might be named who had Bibles 
of their own selection and construction. And thus every book 
in the Bible has passed under the flaming sword of condemna- 
tion, and has been voted down by some ecclesiastical body or 
learned and devout Christian. Each church has either made 
out a Bible for itself, or accepted that which came the nearest 
teaching the doctrine of their own peculiar creed. In the 
midst of this rejection, expulsion, and expurgation of Bibles 
and Bible-books, where can we find " the scripture given by 
inspiration of God"? We have it upon the authority of Dr. 
Adam Clark, Eusebius, Bishop Marsh, and other writers, that 



368 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

many texts and passages contained in our Bible can not be found 
in the earlier editions ; thus showing that many gross interpola- 
tions and forgeries have been practiced by the Christian fathers. 
Christ's prayer on the cross, " Father, forgive them," &c, the 
story of the woman taken in adultery, the passage relative to 
the three that bare record in heaven, &c, the}' assure us, can. 
not be found in any earl}' translation of the Bible. Where, 
then, are "the scriptures given by inspiration of God " ? Who 
can tell? 



CHAPTER LVI. 

INFIDELS UNDER THE ORIENTAL SYSTEMS. 

It is an interesting and instructive historical fact, that in all 
religious countries, — Christian, heathen, and Mahomedan, — as 
the people become educated and enlightened, a portion of them 
improve the teachings of their Bible by new interpretations ; 
while another portion, possessed of still more intelligence, 
abandon the book altogether, and become infidels to the pre- 
vailing religion of the country. I have spoken of the former 
class in another chapter. In this chapter I shall present a 
brief histoiy of the latter class, who are known as infidels 
under different systems of religion. We find, by our historical 
researches, that in India, Egypt, Persia, Chaldea, China, Mex- 
ico, Arabia, &c, a portion of the people outgrow the religion 
of the country in which they have been educated. And it is an 
important fact, observable in all religious countries, that that 
portion of the population who become dissatisfied with the 
established religion Of the country are the most intellectual, 
the mosl Intelligent, and very generally the most moral also. 
We desire the reader to notice this, as it tends to prove that 

the cause Of Infidelity in all countries is intelligence and intel- 
lect, and to establish the converse proposition that the mass 
of people who adhere so rigidly to the religion in which they 
were educated are people of limited intellect, large veneration, 

and not \cry progressive by nature, and very generally have 



INFIDELS UNDER THE ORIENTAL SYSTEMS. 369 

but little historical or scientific knowledge. They consequently 
have not observed the errors and defects of their religion, or its 
cramping and stultifying effect upon the mind, or its effect upon 
the morals of the country. They prefer having somebody else 
to do their thinking for them. This will be fully illustrated by 
the brief historical sketch we will now present of the practical 
operation of infidelity under several forms of religion. 

I. The Religious Skeptics of India. 

It is generally assumed by the disciples of the Christian faith 
that the people of India are on a low scale of mind and intelli- 
gence, and that this accounts for the tardy success of the mis- 
sionaries in the work of converting them to the Christian faith, 
and the obstacles which lie in their pathway, which makes the 
cost of conversion bear an enormous proportion to the few 
proselytes won over to the religion of Jesus. This matter is in- 
terestingly controverted by the Rev. David O. Allen, who spent 
twenty-five years in that country as a missionary. We will 
make an extract from his work, " India, Ancient and Modern." 
Speaking of the obstacles the two hundred missionaries have to 
encounter in the work of conversion, he saj^s, "It is now some 
years since a spirit of infidelity and skepticism began to take 
strong hold of the educated native minds of India. This spirit 
was first manifested in Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay ; and it 
is making rapid progress in all the large cities " (p. 584) . Let 
the reader mark the word " educated ' ' in this extract. Most 
cogently does it sustain the assumption we have several times 
made in this work, that it is intellect and intelligence that 
cause infidelity under every form and s} T stem of religion. It 
denotes an upward tendency from the brute creation, which is 
devoid of intellectual brain. Mr. Allen says, "This class of 
persons [the infidels] have associations and societies for de- 
bates, discussions, and lectures ; and, among the subjects which 
engage their attention at such times, religion, in some of its 
forms and claims, has a prominent place. Their libraries are 
well furnished with infidel and deistical works, which have been 
provided from Europe and America. The historical facts and 
doctrines of the Bible, the ordinances of the gospel, and certain 



370 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

facts and periods of the history of Christianity are made the 
subjects of inquiry, discussion, and lectures. At such times 
Christianity and all connected with it — the scriptures, doc- 
trines, and characters, as well as parts of its history — are 
often treated with levity, scurrility, and blasphemy.' ' Let the 
reader bear in mind that it is a Christian missionary that is 
speaking, who is in the habit of styling every thing "blas- 
phemy ' ' in the shape of argument against his idolized and 
superstitious religion. We are assured from other sources that 
their language, although freighted with argument and wit, is 
always respectable. "On such occasions," continues Mr. 
Allen, " they make a free use of the works of infidel writings, 
and the sneers and cavils and arguments of deists in Europe 
and America. . . . This same class has also, to a great extent, 
the management and control of the national press of India. 
[This statement suggests that infidelity in India is becoming 
deep, wide-spread, and popular.] In their journals much ap- 
pears of an infidel anc] scurrilous nature against Christianity in 
perverted and distorted statements of its doctrines and duties, 
of its principles and its precepts, of the conduct and char- 
acter of its professors, and of the wa} T s and means used for 
propagating it. . . . The following facts show the state of the 
native mind in India: The proprietor and editor of one of the 
oldest and best-supported newspapers in Bombay some time ago 
expressed his views of the state of religion among all classes, 
and suggested what course should be pursued. After inserting 
two or three articles in his paper, to prepare the minds of his 
readers, he said it was obvious to all that the state 4 of religion 
was very sad, and becoming more so, and that all classes of 
people appeared to have lost all confidence in their sacred 
books; that Christians do not believe in their Bible, or they 
would practice its precepts; that the Jews, Mahomedans, 

Hindoos, and the Zoroast rians do not believe in their sacred 

books, because, if they did, they would not do so many things 
which their Bibles forbid, and neglect so many things which 

they command. He then proceeds to say that the sacred books 

of all these different classes may have been of divine origin, 

and when first given they may have been adapted to the then 



INFIDELS UNDER THE ORIENTAL SYSTEMS. 371 

state and circumstances of the people, and may have been very 
useful, but that they had become unsuitable to the present ad- 
vanced state of knowledge and improved state of society ; and 
that none of these sacred books could ever again have the confi- 
dence of the people, and become the rule of their faith and prac- 
tice. ... He then suggested that a religious convention be 
called in Bombay, and that each class of people send a delega- 
tion of their learned and devout men with copies of their sacred 
books, and that the men of this convention should prepare from 
all these sacred books a Shastra suited to the present state of 
the world, and adapted to all classes of people. And he ex- 
pressed his belief that a Shastra thus prepared and recom- 
mended would soon be generally adopted. In his next paper 
he proceeded to mention some of the doctrines which such a 
Shastra should contain ; and among them he said it should 
inculcate the existence of only one God, and the worship of him 
without any kind of idol or material symbol. And then he 
would have no distinction of caste, which he thought was one 
of the greatest evils and absurd things in the Hindoo religion. 
Now, these opinions and suggestions are chiefly remarkable as 
exhibiting the state of the native mind. [Do you mean to say, 
Mr. Allen, that the hundred and fifty millions of the native 
minds in India are all tinctured with these doctrines ? If so, it 
is glorious news indeed.] It is unnecessary to say that these 
views are entirely subversive of Hindooism, involving the rejec- 
tion of its sacred books as well as its preceptive rites and most 
cherished practices. The writer of these articles for the public 
was a respectable and well-educated Hindoo. . . . He was pro- 
prietor as well as editor of his paper ; so he had much interest 
in sustaining its popularity and increasing its circulation. In- 
deed, I was told he had but little property besides his paper, 
and that he relied chiefly upon it for his support. He knew the 
state of religious opinions among the Hindoos ; and he was well 
assured that such opinions and suggestions would not be to the 
prejudice of his character, nor to the injury of his paper. [Glad 
to hear this, Mr. Alien, on his account, and as showing that a 
remarkable amount of good sense, intelligence, and infidelity 
predominate over the Christian religion in India.] Now, this 



372 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

man, the readers of his paper, and the circle of his acquaintance, 
show the state of hundreds of thousands in India, who are dis- 
satisfied with the Hindoo religion, and, having no confidence in 
it, would gladly embrace something better, more reasonable, 
and calculated to exert a better influence upon society and the 
character of their nation." All hail to such intelligence as 
this ! It shows that the heathen of India have more reason, 
sense, and intelligence than many professors of Christianity. 

Now, mark the cause which Mr. Allen assigns for this intel- 
lectual skepticism of India. He sa} T s, "It is in part the effect 
of the knowledge the} T acquire which removes their stupidity 
and ignorance, and imparts power to think, compare, reason, and 
judge on religious subjects ; and in part from the principles 
and facts of modern astronomy, history, geography, &c, being 
utterly at variance with the declarations and doctrines of the 
Hindoo Shastras : so that no person who believes in the former 
can retain airy confidence in the latter. [And, if he had in- 
cluded the Christian Bible with the Shastras, the statement would 
have been almost equally true.] The natural consequence 
of this course of education is to produce a spirit of skepticism 
in respect to all religions. [Another wonderful admission, and 
more proof that infidelity, brains, and intelligence are correlative 
terms.] The effect is now seen in the religious, or rather the irre- 
ligious, views of a proportion of the young men who have been 
educated in European science and literature in the institutions 
ablished by the government of India. They are strongly op- 
posed to Christianity, and often ridicule its most sacred and 
solemn truths [errors more probably]. They openly avow their 
skepticism and deistical sentiments; but they have hitherto genr 
er.'illy conformed to the popular superstitions so far as to avoid 

persecution, and retain their sacred positions, and to secure and 

enjoy their property rights. . . . Motives of worldly policy may 

lend most of the present generation of educated young men 
through life to show some respect to notions, rites, and ceremonies 
which they regard as jalse, unmeanimj. and superstitious j but, 
Should these views pervade the masses of the native population 
(which they are now doing rapidly), they may be expected to 
develop their genuine spirit in very painful consequence, . . . 



INFIDELS UNDER THE ORIENTAL SYSTEMS. 373 

unless Christianity acquires sufficient power to restrain them " 
(pp. 574 and 321). The painful consequence here appre- 
hended is simply the triumph of religious skepticism based on, 
and growing out of, a broad and thorough literary and scientific 
education over the senseless dogmas and superstitions of Chris- 
tianity. Such "painful consequences" will alwa}^s follow in 
any country the enlightenment and expansion of the minds 
of the people by a thorough acquaintance with the principles 
of science and literature. It is just as natural as that light 
should dispel darkness ; and that is exactly what is realized in 
such cases. Mr. Allen's statement that motives of worldly 
policy restrains many of the educated 3'oung men of India from 
avowing their real convictions on the subject of religion shows 
that the same spirit of mental surveillance and priestly despotism 
prevails in India that prevails in all Christian countries, and pre- 
vents thousands from letting their real sentiments be known. 
And this mental slavery has filled the world with hypocrites ; 
but it will soon burst its bonds in India, or would, if the two 
hundred Christian missionaries could be called home. And then 
I would suggest that the tide of missionary emigration be re- 
versed, and that some of those highly enlightened, educated men 
of India be sent to throw some light upon this country. Mr. 
Allen, in the continuation of his subject, states that th; 
government councils of education in India are publishing vari- 
ous works on science and literature, — the production of the 
minds of its own citizens, — and that they have published a large 
number of works of this character within a few years pact. And 
he states that, " if this course is continued, India will soon have 
a valuable indigenous literature " (p. 321). This statement 
tends to enlighten us still further as to the cause of the recent 
rapid spread of infidelity in that country ; for science and litera- 
ture are certain to precede infidelity. But he complains that the 
government system of education, which simply teaches science 
without superstition, while " it is destroying the confidence of 
the people in their own system of religion, is also introducing 
speculation, skepticism, and deism" (p. 321). If he were an 
enlightened philosopher, he would understand that this is the 
legitimate operation of cause and effect. Mr. Allen, in con- 



374 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

eluding this sketch of the rapid progress of skepticism in India, 
sa}'s there are many thousands in India who have passed from 
conviction of the falsehood of the Hindoo religion into a state 
of skepticism and indifference to all religion, unless when the 
progress of Christianity now and then rouses them to oppose it. 
This must be cheering news to every enlightened philanthropist. 
This whole sketch of Mr. Allen's is very interesting, as it dis- 
closes the real causes of infidelity or skepticism in all religious 
countries, and shows that every form of superstition is giving 
way and sinking before the march of science, literature, and 
education in the most populous nation on the globe. It is 
indeed a soul-cheering thought. And where is there a Chris- 
tian professor who is so bigoted as not to derive the hint from 
these historical facts that he can find the cause of his rigid ad- 
herence to his own religion, with all its errors, by simply placing 
his hands on his head? It is true. There are, however, many 
persons who still believe in an erroneous system of religion, 
simply because they have had no opportunity of obtaining light 
on the subject. 

II. Sects and Infidels in Greece and Rome. 

When we arrive at Greece we find a nation possessing a men- 
tal caliber seldom equaled, and furnishing manj r philosophers 
with brains sufficient to enable them to see through the errors 
and the absurdities of any system of religion. Hence infidels 
were more numerous than sectarians ; and those infidels (better 
known as philosophers) nearly succeeded, by the force of supe- 
rior logic and wisdom, in banishing all systems of religious 
superstition from the nation. But questions of controversy 
were more on philosophical subjects than on religious themes ; 
because the dogmas of the popular religion of Greece, like that 
of all oilier countries, were so absurd that the Grecian philoso- 
phers could dispose of them without much mental effort. As a 
proof and illustration of this statement, we will cite the case 
of Stilpo, who, on being asked by Crates (B.C. 881) whether 
he believed th.'it Cod took any pleasure in being worshiped 
by mortals, replied, "Thou fool, don't question me upon such 
absurdities in the public streets, but wait till we are alone." 



INFIDELS UNDER THE ORIENTAL SYSTEMS. 375 

Greece, and also Eome, furnished intellectual minds of a high 
order ; and all their numerous philosophers were skeptical on 
the prevailing forms of religion in those and other nations. It 
will be observed, then, that nearly all the religious orders of 
antiquit}' gave rise to numerous sects, and also numerous infidels 
and skeptics, alias philosophers. 

III. Sects and Skeptics in Egypt. 
Ancient Egypt was characterized by a considerable amount 
of intellectual mind, and no inconsiderable proficiency in the 
arts and sciences. And hence, as would naturally be expected, 
a considerable portion of her people, in the course of time, broke 
from the trammels of the popular religious faith, and became 
infidel to all the systems and sects in the nation ; while those 
of a secondarj' order of intellect abandoned some dogmas, modi- 
fied others, and started new sects. This gave offense to the 
parental religious order, which resulted in one or two cases 
in a serious quarrel, though not with the bloody and deadly 
results which have marked the religious quarrels among the sects 
and followers of "the Prince of peace," which have been so 
sanguine, cruel, and bloody, as to leave eighteen million human 
beings on the battle-field, or consumed by fire, or consigned 
to a watery grave. Religious wars among the heathen have 
not been half so fiendish or fatal as those waged by the disci- 
ples of the cross. The number of sects in Egypt is not known, 
but they were numerous. 

IV. Sects and Skeptics in China. 

China, though characterized by less mental activity than most 
other religious nations, has had her sects and her skeptics, and 
not a very small number of the former, though less in propor- 
tion to her religious population than either Egypt, India, Persia, 
Chaldea, or Arabia. Some of her sects manifested a disposition 
to borrow dogmas from other religions ; while others attempted 
an improvement on the ancient faith established by Confucius, 
although in its moral aspects it was the best system of religion 
extant. The oldest sect known was founded by Laotse, and 
was known as Taotse. His religion differed more from that of 



376 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Confucius with respect to its ceremonies than its doctrines. 
On the whole, there has not been sufficient intellectual growth 
in China to produce any very marked changes in the long-estab- 
lished religion of the country. Innovation and religious im- 
provement in China are checked and almost prevented by a sort 
of ecclesiastical tribunal, which has existed from time imme- 
morial, known as " the Court of Rites," which is invested 
with authority to suppress religious innovation, and thus put 
an extinguisher on infidelity. 

V. Persian Sects and Skeptics. 
Persia has possessed sufficient intellectual mind to make very 
considerable changes in her religion. According to tradition, she 
was once overrun with idolatry. But now, and for at least three 
or four thousand years (and before the time of Moses), that 
nation has manifested the greatest abhorrence to images, excel- 
ling in this respect even Moses, who probably borrowed his 
antipathy to idolatry from that country. Sects have arisen 
which have condemned not only the doctrines of the primary 
system, but its mode of worship. There has been considerable 
controversy among the sects in Persia upon the question whether 
God should be worshiped in temples made with hands, or in the 
open air ; also with respect to the origin of evil, and whether 
the Devil (Ahrimanes) was eternal, or co-eternal with God 
(Ormiizd). These questions of dispute, and various others, 
have given rise to more than sevent}' different sects ; while the 
most intellectual and best improved minds have outgrown and 
renounced them all, and assumed the character of infidels. 

VI. Maiiomkdan Skeptics and Sects. 
Mahomedans have paid very particular attention to educa- 
tion, and the cultivation of the arts and sciences, and have pro- 
duced and published a number of literary works. A num- 
ber of scientific men have arisen among them from time to 
time; tod schools ;md colleges have been established, in which 

many have obtained a literary and scientific education. Hence 
there will be do difficulty in understanding why thousands 
of inlidels or skeptics have arisen amongst them, and avowed 



INFIDELS UNDER THE ORIENTAL SYSTEMS. 377 

their disbelief in the religion of the Koran. Some of them 
have spent much time in writing and speaking in their attempts 
to expose its errors and absurdities ; and a* large number of 
sects have sprung up amongst them from time to time, number- 
ing, on the whole, not less than fifty. All these sects mark the 
progress of religious thought ; and each sect made some im- 
provement in the prevailing creeds and dogmas, or some of the 
religious customs and ceremonials. One of the oldest and 
principal sects was the Sabeans, who claim to be the original 
founders of the Mahomedan religion. They are very devout, 
pray three times a day, — morning, noon, and evening. They 
also observe three annual fasts, offer animal sacrifices, and 
practice circumcision, and cherish other foolish customs, and 
preach other superstitious doctrines, which the cultivation of 
the sciences has had the effect to open the eyes of some of its 
devotees to see the absurdity of. Hence they have left, and 
founded new sects with new and improved creeds. In this 
way a great many new sects have sprung up from time to time, 
as in Christian countries, which marks the progress of religious 
improvement. A great amount of religious controversy has 
been carried on between these belligerent sects, which has had 
the effect, to some extent, to liberalize all. One of the largest 
and most important of these sects has arisen in modern times, — • 
" the anti-Ramazan " sect, — which now numbers not less than 
forty thousand adherents. They discard the feast of Ramazan, 
condemn poly gam}', and contend that no man ought to be 
persecuted for his religious opinions or his infidelity. It will 
be perceived the}' are somewhat radical ; and this is easily ac- 
counted for. Their origin dates since the dawn of literature in 
that country ; and the}' number in their ranks the best educated, 
most enlightened and intelligent professors of the Mahomedan 
faith. Here is suggested again the cause of infidelity, or the 
act of outgrowing the popular faith, which has characterized a 
portion of the disciples of nearly every form of religion known 
to history. Some of the Mahomedan sects rose up against one 
form of popular superstition, and some another. One sect 
opposed the prevailing belief in a physical resurrection, and 
argued that the soul rises only as a spiritual entity. Another 



378 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

sect opposed and exposed the absurdity and obscenit}' of the 
rite of circumcision. Another argued that punishment after 
death would be biit for a limited period. Another sect opposed 
the savage superstition of animal sacrifice, &c. While the 
mother institution, which worshiped in the ancient, moss-covered 
mosque, condemned them all as infidels ; but none of them seem 
to have possessed the amount of intellectual acumen or scien- 
tific intelligence to enable them to perceive that the whole sys- 
tem was defective. Hence they labored to improve it, instead 
of laboring to destroy it, and supply the place with something 
better ; though hundreds and thousands of the educated classes 
had their mental vision sufficiently enlightened and expanded 
to enable them to see truth beyond the narrow confines of 
creeds and dogmas. Hence they abandoned their long-cher- 
ished religious errors, and have since lent their influence to 
expose them, and put them down. 

" Thus round and round we run; 
And ever the truth comes uppermost, 
And ever is justice done." 



CHAPTER LVIL 

SECTS, SCHISMS, AND SKEPTICS IN CHRISTIAN CODNTEIES. 

The practical histoiy of Christianity, ever since the dawn 
of civilization, has beeii that of schisms, sects, and divisions, all 
Indicating the natural growth of the human mind, and its thirst 
lor knowledge, Its struggles for freedom, and its unalterable 
determination to he as free as the eagle that sours above the 
clouds. The number of ohuroh sects is estimated to be more 
than live hundred, and the number is still increasing. And the 

multiplication of Lnfidelfl 1ms kept pace with the increase of the 

churches; and skeptics are now increasing much more rapidly 

than Converts to the churches. This (net accounts lor the lam- 
entations with which church organs and religions magazines are 

now filled with respect to the rapid falling oil' of church mem- 



SECTS, SCHISMS, AND SKEPTICS. 379 

bership, and the decline of church attendance. The people are 
rapidly outgrowing their creeds and dogmas. This causes the 
decline of the churches. We will cite a few facts by way of 
illustration: A recent number of " The Christian Era" states 
that there has been twent3 T -two thousand more deserters from 
the Baptist Church than conversions to it within the brief period 
of five years. This does not look like converting the world, as 
they have avowed their determination to do. And the Meth- 
odist Church, according to "The Watchman and Keflector," 
is losing its members still faster : several thousand have left 
within the past year. u Zion's Watchman " presents us with a 
still sadder picture of the evangelical churches in general. It 
states that religion is on the decline in all those churches, and 
that in some of them it is rapidly dying out. It states, that, 
where one new church is erected, two are shut up ; and con- 
cludes by saying, " Zion indeed languisheth, and religion is at 
a low ebb." It means churchianity religion ; " for pure religion 
and undefiled," the outgrowth of modern intelligence, is on 
the increase, and increases in the ratio of the decline of the 
churches. The cause of Zion in old England appears to be in 
as lamentable a condition as in this country. A recent number 
of " The English Eecorcler " makes the solemn declaration that 
there are five millions of people living without the means of 
grace in that one province, and that, if arranged in a continuous 
line in single file, they would reach the distance of fourteen 
miles. This is rather a large number of immortal souls to be 
traveling the broad road in one nation. And we are informed 
that in Canada a large number of the people have no religion, 
and are on the road to infidelity. To return to this country : 
A colporteur of the American Bible Societ}^ informs us that 
three-fourths of the citizens of Philadelphia, and four-fifths 
of those of New York and vMnity, have no religion, and no 
faith in the religion of the Bible. They must therefore be set 
down as infidels. And the American Christian Commission, 
which assembled not long since in New York, has made some 
startling developments with respect to the decline of church 
attendance throughout the country. This body, I believe, 
represents nearly all the evangelical churches, and is com- 



380 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

posed principally of clergymen. They have had census com- 
mittees traveling the whole country over to ascertain the pro- 
portionate number of church-members and church-goers in every 
city, town, and village in the country. Their report is really 
astonishing ; and, as figures will not lie, these reports prove 
that the orthodox churches are rapidly declining. As indicative 
of the state of the whole country, look at the condition of some 
of our large cities. This vigilance committee tells us that 
three-fourths of the citizens of St. Louis never attend church, 
making about two hundred thousand out of the whole popula- 
tion. And in Boston, according to their figures, the proportion 
of church-members and church-goers is still smaller, being only 
about one-fifth, which leaves two hundred thousand persons 
" out in the cold ; " but it is a kind of cold that is very com- 
fortable compared with the cold, chilling dogmas of orthodoxy. 
Statistics similar to the above are furnished for many of the 
cities, towns, and villages throughout the country, by which it 
appears that many people are forsaking these old, obsolete insti- 
tutions, and that the credal churches are really in a dying con- 
dition. The State of Vermont, taking it at large, furnishes a 
moral lesson worthy of imitation. It is one of the best edu- 
cated, moral, enlightened, and intelligent States in the Union. 
Crime is but little known compared with the world at large; 
and yet only about one in twenty of her citizens is a sound 
church-member. Thus we see that Vermont is about the best 
educated and most moral State in the Union, and, at the same 
time, the most infidel State. Put this and that together. It 
will be seen at once that education, intelligence, morality, and 
infidelity go hand in hand ; and that morality grows out of 
infidelity, instead of Christianity; and that science and infi- 
delity, and not the Bible or Christianity, are to be the great 
levers and Instrumentalities for reforming the world. Where, 
then, is the moral force of Christianity, so much talked of by 

the clergy? And we have it, upon the authority of this national 

body of clergymen, that there are not a sufficient number 

Of church edifices in the country to hold one-half of the people 
if they wi8hed to attend "divine service;" and that, on an 

an average, the churches are not half tilled on the sabbath. 



SECTS, SCHISMS, AND SKEPTICS. 381 

From this statement it is evident that only about one-fifth are 
church-goers ; and a large number of these are not church-mem- 
bers, but attend, as the committees state, for mere pastime. 
This state of things forms a striking contrast with the con- 
dition of things only eighty or a hundred years ago, when 
nearly everybody attended church. To sum up the thing in 
a few words, the case stands about thus : A hundred years 
ago from three-fourths to nine-tenths of the people were church- 
attendants, and the most of them church-members ; but now 
not more than one in eight or ten is a church- adherent, and 
not the half of these are sound or full believers. A gentleman, 
who has recently traveled in every State in the Union for the 
purpose of critically investigating the matter, concludes, as 
the result of his inquiries, that not one in fifteen of the entire 
population of the United States is a sound orthodox believer. 
This, contrasted with the state of the country and churches a 
hundred years ago, shows the difference is great, and that the 
decline of the orthodox faith is rapid, and their approach to 
their final destiny swift and sure. Calculating from the present 
rates of decrease in church interest and belief in church 
creeds, there will not be an orthodox church in existence sixty 
3'ears from this time. Truly does the committee making this 
report sa}^, Ci The state of the churches is alarming;" but it 
is only alarming to the unprogressive adherents to old, musty, 
mind-crushing creeds and dogmas. To us it is not alarming, 
but cause of rejoicing, in view of the fact that the disappear- 
ance of these old soul-crushing institutions will give place to 
the glorious and grand truths of the Harmonial philosoplry, — 
a religion adapted to the true wants of the soul, and calculated 
to save both soul and body from every thing which now mars 
their health, beauty, and happiness. Then every one can u sit 
under his own vine and fig-tree, where none can make him 
afraid" of orthodox devils or an angry God. We bring these 
things to notice for the purpose of showing that a religious body 
which persists in preaching, from year to year and from age to 
age, the same creed, dogmas, and catechisms, without any 
improvement, or even conceding the possibility that they can be 
improved, will fall behind the times, and finally be abandoned 



382 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

by all growing and intelligent minds. They cease to answer 
the moral and spiritual wants of the people, and become as 
cramping to their souls as the Chinese wooden shoes would be 
to their feet. "Excelsior, onward and upward," is the motto 
for this age. And that institution, whether moral, religious, or 
political, which obstinately refuses to live out this motto, will 
die as certainly as that the stopping the circulation of the blood 
will produce death. 

Having spoken of the decadence of the churches, we will now 
look at the counter-picture, — the progress of infidelity. And 
here we observe that leading church-members not only confess 
to the decline of the churches, but concede, on the other hand, 
that what the} T are pleased to stigmatize as infidelity is rapidly 
increasing. We will refer to some of their alarming reports. 
A recent number of " Scribner's Monthly " says, that " at this 
very moment a black cloud of skepticism covers the whole 
moral horizon ; " and the Right Reverend Bishop of Winches- 
ter corroborates the statement b}^ exclaiming, " Infidelity is 
everywhere : it colors all our philosophy and our commonplace 
religion." Professor Fisher, in a warning note to Christian pro- 
fessors, says but few religious teachers are aware of the strength 
of the infidel party, and the alarming prevalence of infidelity 
throughout the country, — that u it pervades all classes of soci- 
ety, and is in the very atmosphere we breathe." If this be true, 
that infidelity pervades the atmosphere, then all must inhale it, 
and become contaminated b} T it, and thus become infidels natu- 
rally, and in spite of airy godly resistance. Hence they should 
not be blamed for what the}' can not help. The Rev. David 
K. Nelson, author of " The Cause and Cure of Infidelity," makes 
Borne wonderful concessions in regard to the alarming preva- 
lence of infidelity among the higher classes. He tells us that 
three-fourths of the editors of our popular newspapers are infi- 
dels, that nearly all OUT law-makers ore infidels, and that " even 
the Church itself is full of infidels." If these statements 
are to be credited) the reverend gentleman may as well aban- 
don all efforts to MTesI it ; for it evidently has the reins of 
government, and can't 1"' stopped, and will ultimately rule 
the nation, and finally the world. Then will we have a ra- 



SECTS, SCHISMSy AND SKEPTICS. 383 

tional religion ; then will the millennium, so long predicted 
b}^ seers and sung of Iry poets, be ushered in as an earthly par- 
adise. This statement of Mr. Nelson's is corroborated by the 
religious magazines of the da}\ "The American Quarterly 
Review ' ' asserts that seventeen-twentieths of the people are 
tinctured with infidelity. This leaves but a small handful of 
the faithful and zealous defenders of the "faith once deliv- 
ered to the saints." The editor of c c The Baptist Examiner ' ' 
says that a member of the United-States Senate remarked to 
him, "There are, I assure j-ou, but very few members of this 
body who believe in your evangelical religion." This is con- 
firmatory of the statement frequently made in this work, that 
our current religion is not adapted to the times ; that it is prac- 
tically outgrown by the better informed classes of society. 
Mr. Beecher says, "Four-fifths of the educated young men 
of the age are infidels." Take notice, " the educated." Here 
is further evidence that infidelity and intelligence are almost 
synonymous terms, — further proof that education and intelli- 
gence alone are needed to banish Christian superstition from 
the world. 

Let it be borne in mind that infidelity, in its true sense, 
simply means want of faith in the worn-out creeds and dogmas 
of past ages, but no lack of faith in any thing good and true. 
If we were to accept the orthodox definition of infidelity, — 
" Want of faith in the precepts and practice of Christ," — then 
it would apply to every Christian professor on earth. There is 
not one of them that is not tinctured more or less with this kind 
of infidelity. There is not a Christian professor who believes 
as Jesus Christ did, or who practices the life he did. For 
example : no civilized Christian in this enlightened age believes 
with Christ that disease is produced by devils, and that, to 
cure the "obsessed," the diabolical intruder must be- cast out 
" of the inner man." In this and other respects all enlight- 
ened Christian professors of the present day differ from the 
precepts and examples of Christ ; hence, strictly speaking, are not 
Christians, but infidels. And we are warranted in saying that 
Christ himself, if living in this more enlightened and scientific 
age, would reject some of the superstitious notions which he cher- 



384 TEE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

ished in common with the religious professors of that dark and 
illiterate era. He was most devoutly honest, but very ignorant 
on scientific subjects. Here permit us to note the fact that 
a very great change has taken place within half a century in the 
practical lives, as well as the religious views, of those w T ho still 
profess to believe in the Christian faith. The time has been 
when nearly all religious professors, including even officers under 
the government, kept a diary of their religious experience, about 
which they talked whenever they met together ; daily engaged in 
vocal prayer, and daily read their Bibles and catechisms ; and 
the latter many of them committed to memory. But now it is 
doubtful whether one-half of even the clergy themselves ever 
read it. And as for the Bible, which used to be read ever}' 
day by Christian professors, probably not one-half of them ever 
see inside of it once in six months, unless it is when they wish 
to settle some controverted question in theolog} r . Some modern 
works of fiction or of travel have taken the place of " the Holy 
Book" on the centre-table, while the newspaper has supplanted 
the catechism. These are some of the extraordinary changes 
which have recently taken place, and are still rapidly going on, 
in the practical lives of Christian professors, which tend to show 
that their faith is daily growing weaker in the soul-saving effi- 
cacy of their religion, or in the belief that it possesses any 
intrinsic importance. This rapid decline in practical Chris- 
tianity will land nearly all its professors on the shores of infi- 
delity in less than half a century. 



CHAPTER LVIII. 

MODERN CHRISTIANITY ONE-HALF INFIDELITY. 

When Martin Luther left the Roman-Catholic Church, and 
adopted the motto, k * Liberty to investigate,' ' he sounded the 
death-knell Of every orthodox ehureh that should afterwards 
spring up outside the jurisdiction of the Pope. Lather was 
higotcdly orthodox, and something of a tyrant : but he had more 



MODERN CHRISTIANITY ONE-HALF INFIDELITY. 385 

intellectual brain and mind than most men of his time ; and 
that intellectual ability, though warped by education and en- 
chained by bigotry and superstition, struggled for freedom as 
minds of that character always do. Luther commenced reason- 
ing (most unfortunate for his orthodoxy) ; but he had been 
living in the murky atmosphere of superstition all his life, and 
preaching a creed that had been stereotyped for a thousand 
years : so that his reasoning powers had been much weakened, 
and he had not sufficient intellectual light to see his way out of 
the dark prison-house of superstition in which the whole Chris- 
tian Church was then enslaved. But he had intellect enough, 
when exercised, to convince him there was something wrong 
in the popular religion of the times ; and he commenced reason- 
ing, though in a very narrow circle. He did not attack ortho- 
dox}', but only the tjTann}^ of its misrule and the audacit} r of 
the Pope. It was only a reasoning mind beginning to feel the 
impulse of intellectual growth. The method which he adopted 
— " liberty to investigate " — was a dangerous experiment for 
orthodoxy, and will yet" prove the death-warrant of all Protes- 
tant churches. The Pope has adopted the only true policy 
for keeping the light of the grand truths of science and infidel- 
ity from entering the darkened doors and windows of the 
Church, and producing schisms and disputes, — that of binding 
the intellect in chains, and laying it at the feet of the Pope. 
But Luther, b}' adopting the motto, " Liberty to investigate/' 
set some orthodox minds to thinking and reasoning ; and a reli- 
gious mind that is allowed to think for itself will eventually 
think and reason its way out of its soul-enslaving creed, or at 
least make some progress in that direction. Hence, ever since 
Luther adopted this grand motto, the Christian Church (except 
that part kept in fetters b}' the Pope) has been gradually mov- 
ing every hour since Luther entered upon this hazardous experi- 
ment of allowing religionists to reason and think for themselves . 
Orthodoxy has been growing weaker. It is becoming gradually 
diluted with the grand truths of science, and now entertains 
broader and more enlightened views. Thus this bigoted spirit of 
orthodoxy is d}'ing by inches. Its days are numbered ; and the 
last orthodox Protestant church will die in less than a century. 



386 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

This is no mere visional dream or random guess-work : it is a 
scientific problem, which can be proved and demonstrated by 
figures. The progress of the churches in the past, in permitting 
the truths of science and the infidelity of the age to displace 
its mind-crushing dogmas, and modify its creeds, furnishes a 
certain criterion for calculating their final destiny ; and, by 
this rule, we are assured its years will be few. Let us look and 
see what progress the Protestant churches have already made 
towards " abandoning the faith once delivered to the saints." 
Some of them are much farther advanced in the line of progress 
than others ; and each new church that has sprung up since the 
daj's of Luther dates a new era in the religious progress and 
onward march of infidelity ; and yet each one professed to be 
sound in the faith, and forbid any one to advance beyond its 
landmarks. Every one proclaimed, Thus far shalt thou go, and 
no farther, in the line of religious progress. We will notice 
them in their order. The old Romish Church held all Chris- 
tians in its iron grasp for eleven hundred years, and hung its 
dark curtains in the moral heavens to exclude the light of 
science. Reason was held in chains, and the intellect crushed 
beneath the foot of popish infallibility. But, after this night of 
intellectual darkness, Luther rebelled, and broke the spell, and 
set what little intellect there was left in the Church to thinking. 
Its doctrines were heathenish. It taught the infallibility of the 
Pope, and the divinity of the Virgin Mary. In this respect they 
were 1 more consistent than the Protestant churches ; for the 
divinity of Christ presupposes the divinity of both his parents, 
otherwise he would be half human and half divine. It also 
teaches the doctrine of election and reprobation, endless pun- 
ishment . and other silly superstitions. In this state of mental 
darkness Greek literature made an attempt to invade its ranks 
and dispel its ignorance with the light of science, but failed, 
— not. however, until it had let a few gleams of Light into the 
intellectual brain of some of the best minds, and set them to 
thinking. This caused a few members to reject the infallibility 
of the Tope, and a division in the Church was the consequence. 
A new Church was instituted, which received the name of "the 
Greek Church." Here we (iud a slight improvement in the 



MODERN CHRISTIANITY ONE-HALF INFIDELITY. 387 

Christian creed. The Greek Christians rejected the doctrine of 
the infallibility of the Pope, but still held to the divinity of the 
Virgin Maiy, and all the other senseless dogmas of the Church. 
But, as it abandoned one of the most popular but unreasonable 
doctrines of the Church, it was an important step toward ad- 
vancement. They did not, however, look upon it in that light, 
but declared it was the true doctrine of the Bible, and here 
planted their stakes, and forbade any further improvement. 
After gathering a Church of seventy million souls, another 
night of intellectual darkness set in, and continued for four 
hundred years ; which brings us down to the fifteenth century, 
when Luther rebelled against the Pope, and again broke the 
spell of mental lethargy and intellectual darkness, and set what 
little intellectual mind there was left in the Church to thinking. 
Another slight improvement was made in the Christian creed. 
The Lutherans not only rejected the doctrine of the infallibility 
of the Pope, but also the divinity of the Virgin Mary, but here 
stopped, and planted their stakes, and issued a bull to interdict 
further progress ; but the ball, once set in motion, can not be 
stopped. As well attempt to bind the ocean with a rope of 
sand as to attempt to stop the march of thought when one link 
is broken which binds it to the Juggernaut of superstition. 
This is true, however, of but few minds. But few church- 
members possess thought and independence enough to advance 
faster than their leaders. Luther did not live long enough to 
outgrow all the superstitious dogmas in which he had been edu- 
cated ; but he made such rapid progress in infidelity that he 
condemned the doctrines of eleven books of the Bible, and 
consequently rejected them ; viz., Chronicles, Job, Ecclesiastes, 
Proverbs, Esther, Joshua, Jonah, Hebrews, James, Jude, and 
Revelation. He was then an infidel with respect to eleven 
books of the Bible ; and, had he lived in an age of progress like 
the present, he would have become an out-and-out infidel. But 
the mass of his followers did not possess minds so susceptible 
of intellectual growth : hence they lived and died in faith with 
the creeds he made for them. There were, however, a few ex- 
ceptions to this rule. In all ages and all religious countries, 
and under every form of religion, there have been a few minds 



388 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

gifted with thought and reason beyond that of the multitude. 
A few of this class figured under Lutherisrn, who eventually, 
by virtue of their tendency to mental growth, discovered some 
defects in his creed and s} T stem of faith. Among this number 
was Arminius", who rejected the doctrine of total depravity, 
original sin, the eucharist, purgatoiy, &c, and, with this change 
of Lutherisrn, founded what became known as the Arminian 
Church : but as no mind and no set of minds in any age have 
possessed the mental capacity to discover all error, or to grasp 
all truth, so Arminius only outgrew a few of the erroneous 
dogmas of the Christian faith, and then stopped, and planted 
his stakes, and stereotyped his creed ; and any opinion or doc- 
trine that advanced beyond that was infidelity. He did not 
live quite long enough to discover the absurdit}' of the atone- 
ment and an endless hell, and hence those doctrines are 
found in his creed ; but the change he made in the popular 
religion furnishes another indubitable proof of the progress of 
mind, and the progressive improvement of the religion of Chris- 
tianity, and another proof of the steady progress Christianity 
has made towards infidelity. So distinct and marked have been 
these changes, that they furnish data for calculating proximately 
the period when the last dogma shall drop out of the creeds of 
the churches, and bring them into conformit}' to the teachings 
of reason and science, — in other words, when Christianity shall 
merge into infidelity. And what is meant by infidelity is the 
want of faith in the false and morally injurious dogmas of the 
superstitions ages. 

Anol her step in the road of religious progress brings us to 
the Unitarian Church. Here we find still longer strides in the 
direction of the Christian faith towards infidelity. The Uni- 
tarians rejected the doctrine of the divinity of Jesus Christ. 
And why? Simply because the founders of thai church had 
expansive intellectual minds that enabled them to perceive the 
absurdity and logical impossibility of the truth of the doctrine. 
Their enlightened reasoning powers enabled them to discover 
these objections to the doctrine: viz. (1) The impossibility of 
incorporating an infinite being into a finite body or into the 
human body; (2) the absurdity of considering any being on 



MODERN CHRISTIANITY ONE-HALF INFIDELITY. 389 

earth a God while there was acknowledged to be one in heaven, 
making at least two Gods ; (3) the difficulty of accepting the 
Bible history of Christ as furnishing proof of his divinity, while 
it invests him with all the qualities of a human being. These 
and numerous other absurdities, which are treated of in "The 
World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors,'' lead them to reject the 
doctrine of the divinity of Christ, while most other Protestant 
churches consider a belief in the doctrine essential to salvation. 
Thus they make a long leap towards infidelity. Having intel- 
lectually outgrown the doctrine, they set themselves to work to 
get it out of the Bible. This was no difficult task : for as many 
texts as may be found in the New Testament in favor of the 
doctrine, a much larger number may be cited in opposition to it. 
And a similar history ma} 7 be given of the Universalist 
Church. It, too, has run into infidelity. The doctrine of Uni- 
versal salvation is a beautiful doctrine : it had its origin in the 
noblest and kindest feelings of the human mind. Messrs. Mur- 
ray and Ballou, founders of the church, were men of broad 
philanthropj- and human s} r mpathy, and possessed the kindest 
feelings. Such men could not brook the idea of endless misery 
for a single soul in God's universe. They were also men of a 
liberal endowment of reason and logical perception, and hence 
rejected the doctrine from logical considerations also. Being 
intellectual and intelligent men, they became convinced that the 
doctrine was wrong. They set themselves to work to get it out 
of the Bible. Their object in doing this was more to save the 
credit of the Bible than to make it an authority to sustain their 
own position. The Bible being a many-stringed instrument, on 
which you can play any tune, they found about as little diffi- 
culty in disproving the doctrine by the Bible as others do in 
establishing the doctrine by that authority. It is wonderful 
with what ease and facility a dozen conflicting doctrines may 
be drawn from the same text. This is because all human lan- 
guage is ambiguous, and that of the Bible pre-eminently so ; 
and this fact demonstrates the absolute impossibility of settling 
an}' controverted theological question by the Bible. Controver- 
sialists who should argue a question before a jury on Bible 
ground, for a week or a month, should, in most cases, have 



390 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

a verdict given in favor of both parties ; for, usually, both 
u beat," and also get beaten. Universalists, taking advantage 
of this ambiguity and uncertainty of Bible language, are now 
able to show that the doctrine of endless punishment is not 
taught in the Book. They succeeded in ruling the doctrine out 
of all the punitive terms to be found in "Holy Writ." The 
word " devil," on being traced to its origin, was found to be a 
contraction of "do evil." With this discover they cast the 
"devil" out of their Bible. The word "hell" was found to 
be derived from the Saxon word " hole ; " and hence, if it can 
have any application in the case, must mean " Symm's Hole." 
c i Hell-fire ' ' originally meant a fire kindled in the vicinity of 
Jerusalem to consume the offal of the city. And thus, accord- 
ing to Universalism, the doctrine of future endless torment is 
no longer a Christian doctrine ; and, whether their position is 
correct or not, it is rather comforting to believe that none of us 
are to be eternally roasted in the future life, and that even 
Satan himself has been released from the "painful duty" of 
ruling that kingdom. The history of both the Unitarian and 
Universalist Churches furnishes evidence of the rapid advance- 
ment of Christianity toward infidelity ; and also the conclusion 
that the natural desires and moral feelings, and also the rea- 
soning faculties, have much to do in forming the opinions of 
Christian professors as to whether certain doctrines are taught 
in the Bible, — whether the}' are scriptural or antiscriptural. 
The wisli is often father to the belief. Just let a certain Bible 
doctrine become repugnant to the natural feelings of some 
pious professor, or at war with his enlightened reason, or in- 
stinctively repulsive to his moral sense, and he will find some 
way to convince himself that it is not a Bible doctrine. A new 
light springing up in the mind has, in many cases. Led to new 
and improved interpretations of the Bible. It seems strange, 
indeed, that none of the two hundred millions of Christian pro- 
feSSOrs have been able to discover that it is the improvement of 
the moral and Intellectual faculties that has done so much to 
improve the doctrines and general teachings of the Bible in 
modern times. The old absurdities and heathenish ideas of 
the Bible arc pumped out by the clerical force-pump, and a new 



MODERN CHRISTIANITY ONE-HALF INFIDELITY. 391 

set of ideas substituted in their place. This keeps it from fall- 
ing immeasurably behind the times. It is a work of moral 
necessny to keep it from being condemned and set aside, or 
trampled under foot. Christian professors can all find abun- 
dant scripture to prove any thing they desire to prove ; but let 
them change their belief, and adopt the opposite doctrine, and 
they can find as much scripture to prove that also. There is 
no difficulty in making out any kind of a creed or code of faith 
that may be desired. Hence a man may change his creed or 
his conduct as often as he pleases, and still be a Christian, or 
at least pass for one. 

Who that is not blinded by priestcraft, or a false religious 
education, can not see that it was the natural growth of the 
moral and intellectual faculties which gave rise to those new 
churches to which I have referred, with their new and improved 
interpretation of the Bible ? Step by step along the pathway 
of human progress, the churches are forced against all resist- 
ance to make occasional improvements in their creeds ; but so 
strong is their resistance to any change, and so determined to 
keep their creeds and dogmas unalterably stereotyped, that 
their improvements are too slow to suit the most progressive 
minds amongst them. Hence they leave the churches to which 
the}' have been tied, and in some cases form new ones, with 
new creeds, better adapted to the improved taste and improved 
moral code of the times. There is not a Protestant church in 
existence that does not furnish incontestable proof that Chris- 
tian doctrines are perpetually changing. There is not a Protes- 
tant church that is not on the high road to infidelity. They 
have all unconsciously broken loose from the old landmarks. 
There is not One of them that is not now preaching doctrines 
which the}' would fifty or sixty years ago have denounced as 
infidelity. This may be to some a startling statement, but I 
will prove it. 

I have pointed out numerous changes in doctrines made by 
all the modern churches, and their rapid tendency to infidelity. 
I will now show that the churches from which they emanated, 
on account of their immobilit}' and conservativeness, have also 
made radical changes in their creeds, and are moving on in the 



392 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

same direction, being pushed forward by the irresistible tide of 
modern innovation and improvement. They have made more or 
less change in nearly all the doctrines of their creeds. Then 
look at the numerous doctrines once regarded as the very 
essence of Christianity, which they have entirely abandoned. 
We will enumerate some of them : The doctrine of casting out 
devils ; the doctrine of a lake of fire and brimstone ; the doc- 
trine of Christ's descent into hell ; the doctrine of purgatory 
(these two last-named doctrines, Mr. Sears says, "were once 
the doctrines of the Church universal, which nobody called in 
dispute ") ; the doctrine of election and reprobation, fore- 
ordination ; the doctrine of infant damnation ; the doctrine of 
polygamy, &c. These were all once regarded as prime articles 
of the Christian faith ; and most of them were preached by all 
the churches : and now they are all abandoned by most of the 
churches ; thus showing that they improve their creeds as they 
advance in light and knowledge. Thus the enlightenment of 
their own minds leads them to preach more enlightened doc- 
trines, which they erroneously suppose are the teachings of the 
Book, when they are really the product of their own minds. 
The Indian, when he halloos to the distant hills and receives 
back the echo of his own voice, erroneously supposes some one 
is responding to him. In like manner, Christians, when read- 
ing and interpreting their Bible, receive the echo of their own 
minds, which they mistake for the response of the Bible writers, 
and the true meaning of the text. Each new church, springing 
up from time to time, is founded on some new interpretation of 
the Bible, and flatters itself, that, for the first time since the 
establishment of Christianity, it has found the true key for un- 
locking all the mysteries and explaining all the doctrines of the 
Bible; and that all the churches which preceded it were in 
the dark, each of which interpreted the same texts differently, 
with the same conviction that they had found the true key for 
laying open the hidden mysteries of the "word of God." 
But the probability is, that it' the Bible writers could be called 
up from their graves, and interrogated about the matter, they 
would declare that not one of the churches had guessed at the 
real meaning of those texts which they are quarreling about the 



MODERN CHRISTIANITY ONE-HALF INFIDELITY. 393 

meaning of ; that they are all far from the mark ; and that they 
have all saddled a meaning on the texts which the writers never 
intended, and never thought of, and would make them smile to 
hear of, — though, in many cases, they have made decided im- 
provements on the original meaning, so as to make them more 
acceptable to the enlightened and thinking and intelligent 
minds of the age. This saves the Book from being rejected. 
Did the clerg} T preach the same doctrine they did fifty or a hun- 
dred years ago, they would find themselves minus a congrega- 
tion. It is the improvement they are constantly making in the 
Bible that keeps up its reputation, and saves it from the ruinous 
criticisms and condemnations of the scientific men of the age. 
And yet these changes are wrought unconsciously to the great 
mass of Christian professors ; and many of them would have 
been startled had they been told in early life that the time 
would come when they would believe as they do now, — per- 
haps horrified at the thought, — and would have denounced it 
as the rankest infidelity. The question, then, naturally arises 
here, Where is the use of erecting standards of faith, when you 
believe one thing to-day and another to-morrow ? You admit 
you were mistaken in the belief you entertained a few years 
ago ; and in a few years more, if you have a progressive mind, 
you will admit that your present position is wrong, and suscep- 
tible of improvement. Every Christian professor of much in- 
telligence makes some improvement in his creed in the course 
of his life. Hence it is impossible for him to know what he 
will believe to-morrow, or how much more of an infidel he will 
be than he is to-da}^. One change makes wa}^ for another. The 
wheels of progress move steadily onward : they never stop, and 
never run backward. It is impossible, after }'ou have made 
the slightest change and improvement in your religious belief, 
which is a step in the direction of infidelity, to know how many 
steps you will take in the future. You rnay resolve and re- 
resolve, as most religious professors do, that there shall be no 
change *in your present views ; but that will not prevent it. One 
change proves not only the possibility, but the probabilit} T , of 
another change. Martin Luther once believed, like Rev. Dr. 
Cheever of New York that, u There is not the shadow of a 



394 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

shade of error in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation ; " and 
} T et he afterwards found eleven books of the Bible so full of 
errors, that he decided the}' were not divinely inspired, and re- 
jected them from his creed : and, had he lived fifty years later, 
he might have rejected all the other books of the Bible, and be- 
come as rank an infidel as Paine and Voltaire. Thej- became 
infidel to the whole Bible in the same way he became infidel to 
nearly a fourth of it. The mind which loosens itself from the 
trammels of its earl} r education, and begins to think for itself, 
has launched its bark on the sea of infidelity. One free thought 
is one step toward infidelity ; that is, a disbelief in the dogmas, 
superstitions, and traditions of the dark ages. It is just as 
useless and just as foolish for a man to resolve he will never be 
an infidel, as to resolve it shall never rain, or that the hair on 
his head shall never turn gray ; for he has just as much control 
over one as the other. 

We have shown that the Protestant churches are sailing out 
on the ocean of infidelity, and are making steady progress in 
that direction ; and it is only a question of time when the} T will 
be entirely infidel. It is true, that, owing to the conservative 
character of the church creeds, and the inveterate hostility the 
priests have ever manifested to changing them, upon the as- 
sumption that they are too holy and too sacred to be criticised 
and too perfect to be improved, the churches have made slow 
progress in the way of improving their creeds compared with 
what would have been witnessed in this respect under a more 
libera] and tolerant spirit. Owing to this impediment the 
improvement in Christian doctrine baa not kept pace with im- 
provements in other things. The progress in the arts, science, 
iculture, political economy, the mechanic arts, the line arts, 
&G;, has far Outstripped the improvement of our religious 
institutions, mid their relinquishment of the errors mid super- 
stitions of the past, and nothing but the most absolute 1 com- 
pulsion by the moral force of the progressive spirit of the age 
has induced the churches to make any improvement in their 
creeds and doctrines. The spirit of improvement is manifested 
in every department of business, and in all our numerous institu- 
tions but that of our religion. When it comes to that, it is, 



MODERN CHRISTIANITY ONE-HALF INFIDELITY. 395 

"Hands off! there shall be no changes here." It must still 
continue to wear the same old garments it has worn for nearly 
two thousand years, though they have become must}', soiled, 
and worn, and directly opposed to the spirit of the age. In 
view of this strongly opposing conservative spirit, it is remark- 
able that so much improvement has been realized in our na- 
tional religion as we now witness. This improvement has been 
effected more by the process of changing the meaning of words 
and language than that of changing the text by a new trans- 
lation, as I have already shown. This surgical operation 
has been inflicted upon thousands of texts ; and so fre- 
quently and so generally has tins expedient been adopted by 
churches to get rid of the errors of the "Holy Book," that the 
meaning of some texts has been changed hundreds of times. 
There is one text in Galatians (iii. 20) , which, Christian writers 
inform us, has received no less than two hundred and forty 
interpretations at different times by different writers ; that is, 
two hundred and forty guesses have been made at the mean- 
ing of this one text. "Revelation" is defined as u the act of 
making known." But what is made known by a book, one text 
of which 3'ou have to guess two hundred and forty times at the 
meaning of, and then don't know whether it is right or not ? 
And this is but a sample of many texts scattered through the 
Book, which have been overburdened with meanings in a similar 
manner in order to get a sufficient amount of science and sense 
into them to make them acceptable to the enlightened minds of 
the age. This renovating and revolutionizing process makes 
Christianity a mere system of guess-work, and salvation a mere 
lottery-scheme ; and thousands, in view of this ambiguity and 
precariousness, have come to the conclusion that it is easier to 
find what is right in any question of morals, without recourse to 
the Bible, than it is to find out what the Bible writers desired 
to teach in the case. Why, then, waste such a vast amount of 
time in attempting to find out the meaning of thousands of texts, 
as man}' Christian writers have done in all ages of the Church, 
when, if the meaning could be determined with certainty, there 
would be but little accomplished by it ? For, after all, we have to 
test the truth of the doctrine or precept by our own experience, 



396 TIIE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

in the same manner they proved it, — if the} T proved it at all. 
There has been time enough wasted in this kind of speculation 
to build the Pyramids ; and the world is no wiser or better for 
it. As there is no certain rule for interpreting one text in the 
Bible (and every word originally written in Hebrew had from 
four to forty meanings) , we may guess at the meanings till our 
heads are gray, and then die in doubt. To show how the mean- 
ing of Bible texts has been improved by successive construc- 
tions, I will cite one case. For more than a thousand years 
the various texts which refer to casting out devils were ac- 
cepted as literally true. It was supposed they mean just what 
they say, and that " the old fellow" (King Beelzebub) is to 
be cast out of the inner man, — body, head, horns, and hoofs. 
But, when the age of reason dawned upon the world, it began to 
be discovered that the notion of casling out devils was an old 
heathen tradition, and too senseless for sensible people to be- 
lieve in. Hence, to save the credit of the Book and the credit 
of the Church, casting out devils was interpreted to mean cast- 
ing out our evil propensities, which, although a perversion of 
the meaning of the writer, was an improvement on the original. 
The further acquisition of scientific knowledge, accelerated by 
the invention of the printing-press, revealed the fact that man 
never parts with his evil propensities, or any other propensities, 
however much they may be subdued. Hence Bible-mongers set 
themselves to work to ferret out another meaning for the text. 
They finally decided that casting out devils means restraining 
our evil propensities. This, although far from the meaning of 
the writer, is another improvement on tc God's perfect revela- 
tion." in this way, step by step, this and thousands of other 
texts have been improved from time to time by successive 
translations and interpretations, until " God's Book" has be- 
come partially purged of the errors it would seem he put into 
it : and it may yet, in this way, become a sensible book. 

The interpretation of the Bible has been (as already stated) 
an art in all Christian countries for ages. The original object 
was to obtain the meaning of the Bible writers ; but, in modern 
times, the object seems to be to obtain a meaning to suit the 
reader, without much regard to the meaning of the writer. 



MODERN CHKISTIANITY ONE-HALF INFIDELITY. 397 

This statement may be, to some readers, rather startling ; but 
there can be no question of its truth. Some of our most popular 
Christian writers have avowed it, though in rather an indirect way. 
Hear what the Rev. John Pye Smith, the leading Christian clerg}'- 
man of England, and one of the ablest and most popular in all 
Christendom, says with respect to Bible interpretations: U I 
would advise the clergy everywhere to interpret the Bible ac- 
cording to the spirit of the age." Most wonderful advice 
truly, and a dead shot at the Bible. Let it be understood, then, 
that, according to this Christian divine, Bible readers hereafter 
are to pay no attention to the plain and obvious meaning of the 
Bible language, or to the writer's intended meaning (which is 
the onty true meaning) , but force a meaning into the text which 
you know will be acceptable u to the spirit of the age ; " that 
is, to men of reason and of scientific attainments. The Bible, 
then, is to be venerated henceforth, not for what it teaches, but 
for what it ought to teach, or what the fanciful reader would 
have it teach. Verity, verity, we have fallen upon strange 
times when " God's word," like a nose of wax, is to be 
molded into any shape to suit ' ' the spirit of the times ; ' ' 
but don't let it be supposed that the Rev. John Pye Smith is 
the only. Christian professor who makes God's infallible revela- 
tion succumb to the good sense and intelligence of the age, — 
u the spirit of the times." There is not an orthodox clergj-- 
man, not a Christian church, and scarcely a Christian pro- 
fessor, who does not make the Bible a mere tool in that way, 
None of them, in all cases, accept the literal meaning of the 
Bible. None of them take the dictionary for a guide in all 
cases to determine the meaning of the words of the text. As 
we have said, there is not an orthodox church or clergyman 
who does not frequently abandon the dictionary, and travel out- 
side of it, and coin a new meaning of his own for man}' of 
the words of the Bible, and ingraft into those words a meaning 
the}' never possessed before. They thus assume a license that 
would not be tolerated with respect to any other book ; and 
yet, notwithstanding these countless alterations and changes 
in " God's unchangeable word," — changes in the language, 
changes in the meaning of its words, changes by translation, 



393 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

changes in the import of its doctrine, and changes in the teach- 
ing of its precepts ; yet millions cling to it as " God's perfect, 
unalterable revelation,' ' his " pure and unadulterated word." 
They seem to take the same view of it the old lady did of 
the carving-knife, which, although it had been mended sixteen 
times, had had seven new blades and nine new handles, yet it 
was the same old keepsake which her father had given her fort}' 
years before. The Bible, in like manner, has been altered 
and amended by fifty translations and a hundred and fifty thou- 
sand alterations, according to the learned Dr. Robinson of Eng- 
land, and is still believed by millions to be the same old book, 
— just as God gave it to man. What superstitious infatuation ! 
It is an instructive fact, which we will note here, that all this 
labor of amending and enlightening the Bible is the work of 
the very best minds in the churches, — the growing, thinking, 
intellectual minds in those institutions ; minds that are in a 
state of unrest, that are hungering and thirsting for something 
better ; minds which are unconsciously struggling to get free 
from the trammels of priestcraft and superstition, and the reli- 
gious creeds in which they were educated, and are uncon- 
sciously aspiring for something better, something higher, holier, 
and purer, but can not give up the idolized Book which has 
been so long enwrapped among their heart-strings that it has 
seemingly become a part and parcel of their souls. Hence, 
rather than abandon it and leave it behind them, they prefer to 
remodel and reconstruct it, and bring it up to their own moral 
standard, and thus make a better and more sensible thing of 
it than (iod himself did in the first place; that is, assuming 
that he had any thing to do with it. And they generally put 
newer and better ideas into the Book, and better morals, than 
they ever got out of it ; and finally, in many cases, outgrow 
the current theology, and become more enlightened, more intel- 
ligent, and more useful members of society, than they were in 
any period of their lives. 



CHARACTER OF THE CHRISTIAN'S GOD. 399 



CHAPTER LDL 

CHARACTER OF THE CHRISTIAN'S GOD. 

The object in selecting and presenting the list of texts quoted 
in this chapter is to show that Bible writers entertained a very 
low and dishonorable conception of the " all-loving Father," and 
that, on this account, the reading of these caricatures of Infinite 
Wisdom must have a demoralizing effect upon those who habit- 
ually read them, and accept them as truth. Even if they were 
all accepted as metaphors, or mere figures of speech, that would 
not prevent or destroy their injurious effect upon the mind ; for 
descriptions by metaphor or pictures have the same effect upon 
the mind as literal descriptions or representations. And what 
must be the effect upon the mind of the ignorant heathen who 
read the Book with no suspicion of its being aught but reality, 
as much of it was unquestionably designed to be ? 

1. " There went up a smoke out of his nostrils, fire out of his mouth devoured : coals 
were kindled by it " (2 Sam. xxii. 9) . Suggestion of a volcano. 

2. " He had horns coming out of his hand" (Hab. iii. 4). 

3. " Out of his mouth went a sharp two-edged sword" (Rev. i. 16). Rather a fright- 
ful monster to look at. 

4. " fie shall mightily roar from his habitation" (Jer. xxv. 30). Wonder if it fright- 
ened the saints in glory. 

5. " He shall give a shout, as they that tread the grapes " (Jer. xxv. 30). 

6. " He awaked as one out of sleep " (Ps. lxxviii. 65). The presumption would be he 
had been asleep. 

7. ' ■ And like a mighty man that shouteth by reason of wine " (Ps. lxxviii. 65) . Would 
not this lead to the conclusion he was drunk? 

8. In his anger he persecuted and slew without pity (Lam. iii. 43). Good authority 
for persecuting and killing enemies. No wonder all Christendom is noted for persecu- 
tion and bloodshed. 

9. " His fury is poured out like fire " (Xah. i. 6). Rather a frightful God. 

10. " The rocks are thrown down by him" (Nah. i. 6). Throwing stones is rather a 
ludicrous business for a God to engage in. 

11. He became angry, and sware (Ps. xcv. 11). It is easy to see why swearing is 
so common in Christian countries. 

12. He burns with anger (Isa. xxx. 27) . Who would wish to live in heaven with 
such a being? 

13. "His lips are full of indignation" (Isa. xxx. 27). Who saw his lips? and what 
peculiar aspect did they present to lead to this conclusion? 

14. "And his tongue as a devouring fire " (Isa. xxx. 27). How came the writer to see 
his tongue? 

15. He "is a jealous God" (Exod. xxxiv. 14). Jealous of what? "Jealousy is a 
hateful fiend" (Cato). 



400 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

16. "He shall stir up jealousy like a man of war " (Isa. xlii. 13) . Of course, if he in- 
dulged in jealousy himself, his example would stir up this vile passion in others. 

17. He rides upon horses (Hab. iii. 8). In what part of the universe are those horses 
kept? and how many does he ride at a time? 

18. " He shall cry, yea, roar" (Isa. xlii. 13). Rather a frightful object. 

19. " He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh : the Lord 6hall have them in derision " 
(Ps. ii. 4). " But thou, O Lord, shalt laugh at them; thou shalt have all the heathen in 
derision " (Ps. lix. 8). Who ever heard him laugh? 

20. " The Lord is a man of war " (Exod. xv. 3). What kind of arms does he use? 

21. " I will make mine arrows drunk With blood "(Deut. xxxii. 42). A good archer. 

22. " They have provoked me to anger." — "Anger shows great weakness of mind " 
(William Penn) . 

23. "I will heap mischief upon them." — "Mischief-makers are enemies to society" 
(Socrates). 

24. "I will spend my arrows upon them" (Deut. xxxii. 23). "Arrows are the 
weapons of savages " (Goodrich). 

23. "A fire is kindled in mine anger" (Deut. xxxii. 22). "Anger resteth 'in' the 
bosom of tools" (Solomon). 

20. "I will also send the teeth of beasts upon them, with the poison of serpents" 
(Deut. xxxii. 24). This exhibits a more fiendish spirit than that of Nero. 

27. " I myself will fight against you in anger and fury and great wrath " (Jer. xxi. 5). 
"Anger and' fury disclose a weak and unbalanced mind" (Publius Syrus). 

28. "I will laugh at your calamity" (Crov. i. 26). "Only brutal savages can be 
happy while others are miserable" (Publius Syrus). 

29. " I frame evil against you" (Jer. xviii. 11). Who, then, can deny that God is the 
author of evil? 

30. The spirit said, " I will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets " (1 Kings 
xxii. 22). Of course, then, all the lies they told would be his, and not theirs. 

31. " If I whet my glittering sword" (Deut. xxxii. 41). What a frightful picture for 
the all-loving Father! 

32. " Spare them not, but destroy both men and beasts, infant and suckling " (1 Sam. xv. 
3). We would neither worship such a God on earth, or dwell with him in heaven. 

33. "He was unto me as a bear lying in wait, and as a lion in secret places" (Lam. 
iii. 10). Think of the God of the universe descending from heaven, and crouching in 
ambush, like bears and lions, to spring upon the unsuspecting traveler ! The tendency 
of such a thought is to weaken both moral and intellectual growth. 

34. He will " cry like a travailing woman " (Isa. xlii. 14). • 

35. He is full of vengeance and wrath, and is furious (Nan. i. 2). A savage monster. 
Who would worship such a God? 

36. " The sword without, and terror within, shall destroy both the young man and 
the virgin, the suckling also with the man of gray hairs (Deut. xxxii. 25). 

37. " The sword shall devour, and make drunk with their blood" (Jer. xlvi. 10). 

The language of the above is blasphemous and shocking to 
refined feelings, whether accepted as literal or figurative. 

Though but just begun, we will pursue this sickening theme 
no further at present. It is an unpleasant task to pen these 
shocking pictures of " Divine Goodness ; " but the time has ar- 
rived when these evils should be fully exposed, that Christian 
professors may see the error of preaching the doctrines of the 
Aenri-barbarofui Ages, which have the eflfefct to dwarf the intel- 
lect and repress the growth of every healthy moral emotion of 
the mind, and llms retard the moral and intellectual progress 
!y. Such Considerations loudly call for a full exposition 
of the errors and evils of biblical theology, so long concealed 
under the sacred garb of " inspiration." 

I .—This chapter might easily be extended to a hundred pages of similar ex- 
amples. 



ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY ERRORS. 401 



CHAPTER LX. 

ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY ERRORS OF JESUS CHRIST. 

In "The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors," under the 
head of " The Two Hundred Errors of Christ," the author has 
pointed out sixt} r errors in his teachings and practical life. It 
was the intention of the author to have completed the expo- 
sition in this chapter ; but he has discovered that a full and 
thorough elucidation of all the errors would swell this volume 
beyond its proper size. He has therefore concluded to present 
a mere abstract of one hundred and fifty of those errors in this 
work, and reserve a fuller exposition to be comprised in a 
pamphlet to be published soon, and to contain also thirteen 
powerful and unanswerable arguments exposing the numerous 
absurdities and impossibilities of the orthodox theory that 
Christ possessed two natures, human and divine, — that he 
was both God and man. This assumption is known as "the 
hypostatic union," or dual nature of Christ. The pamphlet, 
comprising these two subjects, can be had when published, of the 
usual booksellers or the author, for twenty-five cents. 

The admirers and worshipers of Jesus Christ adore him as a 
being of absolute perfection, — perfect in intelligence, perfect 
in wisdom, perfect in power, perfect in judgment, perfect in his 
practical life, and perfect in his moral inculcations. We are 
told, "He spake as never man spake;" and, finally, that he 
taught a system of religion and morals so absolutely faultless 
as to challenge the criticism of the world, and so perfect as to 
defy improvement : and to doubt or disbelieve this dogmatic 
assumption is to peril our eternal salvation. With this kind 
of teaching and preaching in the Christian pulpit for nearly two 
thousand 3-ears, it is not strange that the great mass of Chris- 
tian professors have been blinded and kept in ignorance with 



402 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

respect to his numerous errors, which modern science has brought 
to light both in his teachings and his practical life, a portion 
of which will be found briefly noticed in this chapter under 
three heads: viz., (1) " Christ's Moral and Religious Errors," 
(2) " Christ's Scientific Errors," (3) " Christ's Errors of 
Omission." -• ' 

I. The Moral and Religious Errors of Christ. 

In " The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors" we have, 
under the above heading, shown (1) that Christ possessed a 
very ardent religious nature ; (2) that he was unenlightened by 
scientific culture, (3) and that consequently he often indulged 
in the most extravagant views of the duties of life ; (4) that he 
inculcated a moral and religious system carried to such extremes 
as to render its obligations utterly impossible to be reduced to 
practice ; (5) that his injunction, u Take no thought for to-mor- 
row," is of impracticable application, and never has been lived 
up to b}' any of his disciples in that age or since ; (6) that, if 
reduced to practice, it would starve the world to death in less 
than twelve months ; (7) that his injunction, " La}' not up treas- 
ures on earth" (Matt. vi. 19), has been ignored and trampled 
under foot by the whole Christian world ; (8) that his injunction 
to his disciples to part with all their property (Matt. xix. 21) 
would soon fill the world with paupers ; (9) that his promise to 
supply all the necessaries of life to those who shall 4i Beck first 
the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. vi. 33) has never been ful- 
filled; (10) that his injunctions, " Resist not evil," (11) when 
smitten on one cheek, turn the other also, are virtual invita- 
tions to persona] abase ; (12) that his mandate, "Love not the 
world:" (13) also, u to hate father and mother, brother and 
sifter," dbe. (Luke xiv. 26) ; (U) also, to give Up voluntarily 
our garments when attacked by a robber (Matt. v. 40) ; (15) 
also, to make no defense of our lives when they are sought by 
murderers (Luke wii. 88), are all extravagant, unnatural, and 
unreasonable moral obligations : ( 16) that his declaration to his 
diseiples. that, they would he M hated by all men " (Matt. x. 22), 
(17) and his injunction to shake off the dust of their feet 
against their skeptical hearers, (18) and # go and teach all na- 



ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY ERRORS. 403 

tions," (19) and " take nothing for your journe} r " (Mark. vi. 8) , 
are all indications of a mind run wild with religious fanaticism ; 
(20) as is also the declaration, " He that believeth not shall be 
damned ; " (21) and " He that believeth and is baptized shall 
be saved" is equally unreasonable ; (22) that all things asked 
for in prayer believing has never been realized by any person ; 
(23) that it sets aside all natural laws. (24) It is calculated 
to encourage idleness and sloth, (25) and thus bring on misery 
and starvation. (26) The commands to " call no man ' father ; ' " 
(27) also, " Call no man ' a fool ; ' " (28) also, to *f pray without 
ceasing; " (29) also, to forgive our enemies four hundred and 
ninety times (" seventy times seven"); (30) also, to " love 
your enemies " (Matt. v. 46) ; (31) also, to plucfk out our eyes 
and cut off our hands if they offend us ; (32) and, also, to be- 
come eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake, are utterances 
which bespeak a mind devoid of a knowledge of either natural 
or moral philosophy ; (33) as does also the injunction to be- 
come perfect as (God) our Father in heaven (Matt. v. 48). 
(34) His belief in an angry God ; (35) his injunction to fear 
God (Matt. x. 28) ; (36) his advice to his followers to live 
like the lilies of the field (Matt. vi. 26) ; (37) his statement 
that " the meek should inherit the earth," (38) that his disci- 
ples would be hated b}* all men ; (39) his reasons for forbidding 
them to swear ; (40) his blessing on the poor ; (41) his denun- 
ciation of the rich; (42) his parable of Dives; (43) his en- 
couragement to mourn ; (44) his blessing on the pure in heart, 
(45) and on the hungry and thirsty; (46) his choosing the 
ignorant for companions ; (47) his setting the mother against 
the daughter (Matt. x. 36) ; (48) his getting angiy (Matt. 
xxi. 12) ; (49) his treatment of his mother, (50) also of the 
money-changers, (51) and of the Pharisees ; (52) his usurpation 
of property (Matt. xxi. 2) ; (53) his calling men "fools and 
Irypocrites," (54) also "vipers," (55) and ■" children of the 
Devil" (John viii. 44) ; (56) his enjoining his disciples to 
shake off the dust of their feet against them, (57) and to call 
no man u rabbi," (58) and no man "master;" (59) his 
falsehood about going to Jerusalem (John vii. 8); (60) his 
substituting water for wine ; (61) his strong sectarianism 



404 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

(John x. 1) ; (62) his treatment of the Gentiles (Matt. x. 
5) ; (63) his threat toward Jerusalem ; (64) his calling honest 
men " robbers " (John x. 8) ; (65) his denunciation of Sodom 
and Gomorrah, (66) and Chorazin and Bethsaicla (Matt, 
xi. 21), (67) and Capernaum; (68) his answer to the woman 
of Samaria, (69) and his calling Peter " Satan;" (70) his 
hatred of the world, (71) and contempt of life, — all these pre- 
cepts and practices, when critically examined, are found to be 
at variance with the laws of moral science as taught in this 
enlightened age, which establishes the fact that Christ was no 
moral philosopher. 

II. Scientific Errors of Christ. 
The following scientific errors of Christ, a portion of which 
are exposed in u The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors/ ' 
show that he was neither a natural nor a moral philosopher : 

(I) He assumed that disease is produced by demons, or evil 
spirits. (2) He generally treated disease, not as the result of 
natural causes, but as produced by evil beings. (3) His rebuk- 
ing a fever (Luke iv. 39) discloses an ignorance of the science 
of physiology. (4) His declaration about the stars falling 
(Matt. xxiv. 29) evinces his ignorance of astronomy ; (5) as does 
also his belief in the conflagration of the world (Matt. xxiv. 
34). (6) His belief in a personal devil (Matt. xvii. 18), (7) 
also his belief in a literal hell (Matt, xviii. 8), (8) also a 
belief in the unphilosophical doctrine of repentance (Mark ii. 
17), (9) and also that of divine forgiveness (Matt. vi. 12) ; 
(10) his repeated assumption that belief is a voluntary act of the 
mind ; (11) liis frequent reference to the heart as being the seat 
of consciousness; (12) the great importance he attaches to a 
right faith ; (13) his unpardonable sin against the Iloty Ghost; 

(II) his superstitious idea of casting out devils; (1T>) his com- 
paring Faith to a grain of mustard-seed (Matt. xi. 2:]) ; (16) 
the promise of •• well done" (Malt. XXV. 21) as a reward for 
well-doing; (17) bis statement about man increasing his stat- 
ure. (18) and about two men joining in prayer (Matt, xviii. 
19) ; ( 19) his promise to come In the clouds of heaven (Matt. 
xxiv. 80) ; (20) the time that event was to take place (Matt. 



ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY ERRORS. 405 

x. 23) ; (21) his penalty for wrong-doing, or sin ; (22) his pen- 
ahy for falsehood (John viii. 44) ; (23) his superstitious belief 
in an undying worm ; (24) his penalty for idle words ; (25) 
his statement about speaking in new tongues (Mark xvi. 17), 
(26) about handling poisonous serpents, (27) also swallowing 
deadly poisons, (28) and that these acts should furnish a proof 
of divine power; (29) his frequent confabs with imaginary 
devils ; (30) his views of the marriage relation (Luke xx. 34) ; 
(31) why a certain man was born blind (Matt. vii. 22) ; (32) 
his ignorance of the natural causes of physical defects ; (33) 
his conduct toward the fig-tree (Matt. xxi. 20) ; (34) his 
statement relative to the Queen of Sheba, (35) and relative to 
Noah's flood (Luke xvii. 27) ; (36) his frequent denunciation 
of unbelievers ; (37) his injunction to become perfect as God ; 
(38) his erroneous views of love, (39) and of the peacemakers, 
(40) and of the tax-gatherers, (41) and of divorce ; (42) his 
views of alms ; (43) his statement about Moses (John v. 46) , 
(44) about Mcodemus, (45) about bearing witness, (46) 
about letting our light shine, (47) about his disciples praying, 
(48) about praying for the kingdom of heaven, (49) about the 
law (Matt. v. 17), (50) about his being the Christ (Matt. 
x. 23), (51) about performing miracles, (52)' about bringing a 
sword, (53) about his disciples sitting on the twelve thrones, 
(54) about judges in heaven, (55) about the fate of Judas ; 
(56) his deception by Judas ; (57) his mistake about Peter ; (58) 
his promise to the sons of Zebeclee (Matt. xx. 23) ; (59) his 
parable of the unjust judge ; (60) his new commandment ; (61) 
his promise of a hundred-fold reward ; (62) his ideas about 
pajing tribute, (63) also about marrying a divorced woman; 

(64) his promising Peter the keys of the kingdom of heaven ; 

(65) his declaration relative to binding things in heaven ; (66) 
his notion of merit in religious belief, (67) and that faith is the 
gift of God ; (68) Ms ideas of lust, (69) and about earthly 
treasures, (70) also treasure in heaven, (71) about tomb- 
stones, (72) and about an arbitrary personal God ; (73) his 
ignorance of science and natural law. (74) He never spoke of a 
natural law, (75) nor used the word "science," (76) nor 
" natural philosophy." (77) And, finally, his spending nine- 



406 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

tenths of his time in idleness or obscurity is historic, scientific, 
and practical proof against his divinity. From all the facts 
and precepts enumerated above, we are compelled to conclude 
he was no philosopher, and was ignorant of the principles of 
natural science. And this accounts for the numerous scientific 
errors which abound in all his teachings and preachings and 
his whole practical life, as set forth in the work of which this 
is a synopsis. 

III. Christ's Errors of Omission. 

Had Christ been an all- wise and omniscient God, — the char- 
acter his orthodox disciples claim for him, — he would have 
noticed and understood, and consequently have condemned, 
various demoralizing practices, customs, and institutions then 
existing in society. He would also have discovered and taught 
the grand moral and scientific truths and principles which have 
since been brought to light, and have proved such signal bless- 
ings to society, so that the world could have enjoyed them two 
thousand years ago. 

(1) He would, in the first place, have discovered and exposed 
the evils of the despotic form of government under which he 
lived, (2) and have suggested a better system. (3) He would 
have taught the people the beauties and benefits of a true democ- 
racy, (4) and would have exposed the evils of physical as well 
as mental slaver}* ; (5) also the deleterious and demoralizing 
effects of intoxicating drink, instead of manufacturing it. (See 
John ii. 7-!).) (G) He would also have exposed the errors and 
cavils of the many popular religious superstitions then and there 
prevalent, instead of indorsing them. (7) He would have 
taoghl the science of anthropology as essential to human hap- 
piness, (8) including the principles of mental science; ( ( .)) and 
likewise the true principles of mora] science, (10) and the 
necessity of mental culture, (11) and the most important lesson 
of nil. — thai <>f self-development. (12) He would have taught 
the people thai everything is controlled by natural law, (18) in- 
stead of by the caprices of an angry God. (14) He would have 
taught the people that right and wrong are natural principles ; 
(IT)) thai virtue contains its own reward, (1G) and sin or crime 



BOCTBINES OF THE APOSTLES. 407 

its own punishment. (1 7) He would have taught the science of 
life and the laws of health as essential to human happiness ; 
(18) and that the violation of natural law must be attended 
with suffering ; (19) and that every immoral act a man com- 
mits against another must injure himself, (20) and destroy his 
true happiness, (21) and tend to make him a victim to his own 
passions. (22) He would have taught the true principles of 
mental freedom, (23) and the rights of conscience in matters of 
belief; (24) and that man is responsible to himself alone for his 
belief. (25) And, finally, he would have taught the modern doc- 
trine of evolution as furnishing the true and philosophical solu- 
tion of all human actions, both good and bad. Certainly a being 
possessing infinite wisdom could have discovered and brought 
to light these grand practical truths, and thus greatly aug- 
mented the sum of human happiness, instead of leaving the 
world to drag on in suffering ignorance. And his omitting to 
do it must be characterized as an error of omission. For a fuller 
exposition, see the pamphlet. 



CHAPTER LXI. 



CHARACTER AND ERRONEOUS DOCTRINES OF THE 
APOSTLES. 

Christ's apostles, although reputedly inspired, were very far 
from being exemplary characters. Quarrels, jealousies, and 
emulations are frequently disclosed in their practical lives. We 
are told there were " envyings and jealousies and divisions " 
among them (1 Cor. iii. 3), and that " they disputed among 
themselves who should be the greatest" (Mark ix. 34). This 
implies that there was selfishness and worldly ambition at the 
bottom of their movements. Paul also represents them as 
" defrauding" and lawing each other (1 Cor. vi. 7, 8) ; and Paul 
himself had a serious quarrel with Barnabas, as we are told : 
1 ' The contention was so sharp that they departed asunder one 
from the other" (Acts xv. 36). These incidents in the prac- 



403 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

tical lives ; of the apostles show that they were frail and fallible 
mortals, and under the control of selfish feelings like the rest 
of us, and that their " inspiration," if they possessed any, was 
not of a very high order. Such men are very unsuitable exam- 
ples for the heathen to imitate, as they are impliedly recom- 
mended to do when the Bible is placed in their hands. 

With respect to the doctrines taught by the apostles or New- 
Testament writers, we will here assume the liberty to say they 
contain more errors than we can allow space to enumerate. 
For those of Paul and Peter we shall appropriate a separate 
chapter, but will only cite a few of the errors of the other 
New-Testament writers as mere samples of others. James's 
superstitious idea of curing the sick b} T prayer and oil we have 
alread}' noticed (chapter xh\). He also indorses the foolish 
and incredible stoiy of Elijah controlling the elements so as 
to cause a three-years' drought (chap. v. 17). He tells us we 
can get wisdovi by simply asking it of God (chap. i. 5). Then 
wh} T do millions of people devote years to hard mental labor 
to acquire it? He speaks approvingly of the practical life of 
Abraham, also of the miserable harlot Rahab (chap. ii. 23, 
25), and avows his belief in a devil, &c. John also avows 
his belief in this superstition (1 John ii. 13), and likewise in 
the bloody atonement (1 John i. 7) and the doctrine of pre- 
destination (1 John v. 18) ; and, worse than all, he issues the 
bigoted mandate, "Receiveno man into your house" who does 
not preach the doctrine I do (2 John i. 10). Jude indorses 
the; foolish story of Sodom and Gomorrah, the contest between 
Michael and the Devil, the second advent, a day of general 
judgment, &c. These will do for specimens of apostolic errors. 



CHAPTER LXIL 



CHARACTER OF PAUL, AND HIS DOCTRINES. 

Paul, standing at the head of the Church in the apostolic 
age, and being the principal New-Testament writer and the 



CHARACTER OF PAUL, AND IIIS DOCTRINES. 409 

principal teacher and doctrinal expounder of the New Covenant, 
or gospel dispensation, his practical life and his doctrines must 
therefore be regarded as constituting a part, if not the princi- 
pal part, of the basis of the Christian religion. We shall there- 
fore make no apology for presenting here a brief exposition of 
his character and his doctrines ; and we shall show that both 
present numerous defects and inconsistent and contradictory 
features. 

1. In his First Epistle to Timothy (i. 13) he states that he 
had been "a blasphemer and persecutor, and injurious," and 
confesses that he was particeps criminis in the martyrdom of 
Stephen; yet, in the Acts of the Apostles, he declares, "I 
have lived in all good conscience before God unto this day" 
(Acts xxiii. 1). Here is one specimen of his many incongru- 
ous statements. 

2. He relates the account of his miraculous conversion three 
times, and in three different ways. In the first statement he 
says, " The men stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing 
no man " (Acts ix. 7). In the second account he says, " They 
heard not the voice that spake to me " (Acts xxii. 9). In the 
third statement, when relating the case to King Agrippa, he 
says, u They were all fallen to the earth" (Acts xxvi. 14) ; 
while, in the first account, he had stated, " The men stood 
speechless." It is evident they could not stand speechless 
while they were all fallen to the earth. 

3. In one account he states that Jesus told him to stand up, 
and receive his mission ; but in another place he says he was 
ordered to go to Damascus to receive the message. 

4. He told the king that he showed himself first at Damas- 
cus, and then at Jerusalem (Acts xxvi. 20) ; but in his Epistle 
to the Galatians he declares that he did not go to Jerusalem. 

5. Again he says he went to Jerusalem, and Barnabas took 
him by the hand, and brought him to the apostles (Acts ix. 
27). 

6. And then, again, to the Galatians he declares he saw none 
of the apostles, " save James, the Lord's brother " (Gal. i. 18). 

7. In 1 Cor. x. 35 he says, " I please all men in all things ; " 
but in Gal. i. 10 he says, "KI yet pleased men, I should not 



410 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

be the servant of God." Here, then, is another palpable con- 
tradiction. 

8. In Rom. xi. 5 he speaks of the " election of grace ; " but 
in Tit. xi. 9 he says the grace of God has appeared to all. 

9. In his letter to Timotlry he says, " God will have all men 
to be saved (1 Tim. ii. 4) : but in Rom. ix. 22 he speaks of 
i; the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction ; " and in Rom. ix. 
27 he says, U A remnant shall be saved." All will not be 
saved if only a remnant are saved. 

10. When about embarking for Rome he stated, " I perceive 
the voyage will be of much hurt and damage to life" (Acts 
xxvii. 10) ; yet on the voyage he declared, " There shall be 
no loss of any man's life among you" (Acts xxvii. 22). An 
" inspired apostle" and oracle of God should be punctiliously 
accurate in all cases, or all his statements will be brought under 
distrust, and it will be impossible to arrive at the truth in the 
case ; or, in any case, all will be involved in doubt and conjec- 
ture. 

11. Paul's errors in doctrinal inculcations are numerous. 
His confession to the Corinthians, that, " being craft} r , I caught 
you with guile " (2 Cor. xii. 16), sets forth a bad example, and 
indicates a bad S}'stem of morals, which is calculated to have a 
demoralizing effect upon Bible readers and believers, especially 
the heathen and the youth of Christian countries. 

12. And his statement that the truth of God " hath more 
abounded through my lie unto his glory" (Rom. iii. 7), is still 
more demoralizing in its tendencies. Many have looked upon 
it as a justification for lying. It seems to imply that lying is 
all right if done for the gloiy of God; and as he states in 
1 (or. x. SI, thai whatsoever we do should be done to the glory 
of God, it Logically follows that lying is justifiable in all cases. 
And Mr, Biggins states that such doctrine had the effect to re- 
duce Lying to a system Among the early Christians, and that 
they considered it a duty to lie when the interest of the Church 
Could be promoted by it. A book inculcating such bad morali- 
ty should not be circulated amongst the heathen. 

18, Paul's reason for recommending a life of single blessed- 
ness is deserving of notice, lie says the unmarried man careth 



CHARACTER OF PAUL, AND HIS DOCTRINES. 411 

for the things of the Lord ; but the married man careth for the 
things of the world, — " how he may please his wife " (1 Cor. 
vii. 33) . The last act he named here does not trouble men much 
nowadays, at least after the honeymoon is passed ; and a man 
who considers God worthy of more attention than wives, as 
Paul did, would not be likely to bestow a very high apprecia- 
tion on the latter. But the greatest objection to the doctrine 
is, that, if practically carried out in accordance with his recom- 
mendation, there would soon be no wives to please. 

14. We must notice another objectionable doctrine of Paul with 
respect to marriage. Instead of acknowledging an honorable 
and virtuous motive for marriage, he would tolerate it as the 
least of two evils ; that is, as a means of mitigating a burning 
lust (1 Cor. vii. 9) . This makes marriage a mere animal attrac- 
tion, — the union of a man and woman drawn together from lustful 
motives. Paul advises bachelors not to marry or touch a woman, 
but remain single like himself (1 Cor. vii. 1) . But such advice, 
if practically complied with, would soon depopulate the globe. 
If not so strongly adverse to human nature, it would doubtless 
ere this have filled the world, first with Shakers, and then with 
the graves of an extinct race. 

15. Paul says to the Romans (Rom. vii. 17), " It is no more 
I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. For I prove . . . 
that in my flesh dwelleth no good thing." Here are taught two 
erroneous doctrines : (1) The essentially corrupt and sinful 
nature of the human body, taught anciently by the Hindoo as- 
cetics ; (2) that sin or the Devil operates on the mind independ- 
ent of the human will or volition, which savors of fatalism. And 
his statement that some vessels are made to honor, and some to 
dishonor (Rom. ix. 21), seems unequivocally to set forth the 
same doctrine. Manj^ commentators have puzzled their brains 
over it to make it mean something else, but with ill success : 
the declaration is not, that men become vessels of honor and dis- 
honor, but that they are made so. 

16. Paul's exhortation to servants to be obedient to their 
masters has furnished pious Christian slaveholders a good text 
to preach from throughout slaveholcling Christendom, and has 
done much to rivet the chains tighter upon the limbs of the 
slave. 



412 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

17. When Paul calls the Cretans " liars, evil beasts," &c, 
he descends to a low position, both in the scale of manners and 
morals : he is not only uncivil, but exhibits bad passions. They 
did not merit such personal abuse, as they had never done him 
an injury, at least we have no proof of it. 

18. Paul tells us that God sends people a strong delusion, 
that the} T may believe a lie and be damned (2 Thess. ii. 12). 
More fatalism. To delude people with lies in order to damn 
them is worse than hardening Pharaoh's heart in order to find 
a pretext for drowning him. Let it be borne in mind, 
that, if there is any spiritual signification justly assignable to 
this text, it can only benefit the few, as the common people 
always accept language with its common signification. But 
can we assume that Paul was such a blunderer that he frequently 
used language conveying exactly the opposite meaning from 
that intended, and that in this wa} r he taught fatalism and 
immoral doctrines when he did not intend to do so? And then,, 
as it is claimed he was inspired, is it not a slander upon 
Infinite Wisdom to assume that God was so ignorant of human 
language that he put these pernicious doctrines in Paul's mouth 
by mistake? One or the other of these conclusions we are 
driven to accept, in order to save Paul from condemnation ; 
but this onl} T saves his moral character at the expense of his 
good sense. The most rational assumption appears to be, 
that Paul lived in an age and country which knew nothing of 
mental or moral science, and honestl}' believed and taught these 
pernicious doctrines. We will now learn something about the 
moral code of bachelors. 

ID. w - I sullrr not a woman to speak in the church." " It is 
a shame for a woman to speak in the church " (1 Cor. xiv. 35). 
He says, if they want to know any thing, let them ask their 
hasbands at home. Bat this, in some cases, would be the blind 
Leading the blind; and, in other eases, onl} r the leaders would 
blind. Paul should have learned the lesson of O'Connell, 
the [rish agitator, who said, "Since J have learned that my 
mother was a woman, 1 have great respect for women, and 
advocate their rights." 

20. We will now notice the reason Paul assigns for having 



CHARACTER OF PAUL, AND HIS DOCTRINES. 413 

wives subject to their husbands : it is simply because man was 
created before woman (1 Tim. ii. 13). What profound logic! 
worthy a Locke or a Newton ! But, if there is any logical force 
in the argument, then monke} r s should have the preference of 
men in the churches, as they came still earlier in the order of 
creation. 

21. Paul's doctrine that all governments are ordained of 
God, and that those who resist them shall receive to themselves 
damnation (Rom. xiii. 1), is a virtual condemnation of those 
noble philanthropists who in various ages and countries resisted 
the authority of t}Tants. It makes Washington, Jefferson, 
Franklin, and others sinners and criminals for opposing the 
tyranny of King George. 

22. Paul evinced a very intolerant spirit when he said, "If 
any man preach any other doctrine than that which I declare 
unto you, let him be accursed" (1 Gal. i. 9). This is the spirit 
of intolerance, persecution, and bigotry, — the spirit which 
has erected the scaffold, piled the fiery fagots around the stake, 
wielded the guillotine, adjusted the halter around the neck 
of the mart}T, and crimsoned the earth with the blood of the 
righteous. This very text has had the effect to fire up such a 
spirit ; and it has frequently been quoted as authorit} 7 for such 
cruel deeds as those just cited. 

23. Paul gives utterance to a very singular doctrine when he 
says that even nature teaches that it is a shame for a man to 
wear long hair, but the glory for a woman, because nature gave 
it to her for a covering. (See 1 Cor. xi. 14.) He was certainly 
not much of a philosopher, or he would have made the dis- 
covery that nature promotes the growth of the hair upon the 
heads of men and women exactly alike. If nature did not 
permit any hair to grow upon the head of man, or did not 
allow it to grow more than an inch in length, there might be 
some plausibility in the assertion. But, as the case stands, it 
is the shears, and not nature, which teaches that it is a shame 
for a man to wear long hair ; or rather, if there is any shame in 
the case, it consists in man cutting off his hair after nature 
has been so kind as to supply him with such a useful covering. 

24. Paul's indorsement of the doctrine of the atonement, and 



414 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

his declaration that " without the shedding of blood there can 
be no remission for sin" (Heb. ix. 22), show that he had not 
advanced be} T ond the old Jewish and pagan superstition of 
u blood for blood." The doctrine is a relic of heathen bar- 
barism, and is shocking to persons of fine moral sensibilities ; 
but this subject is treated in another chapter. 

25. Paul also indorses the old heathen tradition that God is 
an angry, revengeful being. (See Eph. ii. 3.) He lent the 
influence of his powerful mind and pen to perpetuate this 
demoralizing and blasphemous doctrine, which has had an 
injurious effect upon the minds and morals of the people in all 
past ages. 

2G. We again call attention to Paul's declaration that God 
sent the people a strong delusion that the} T might believe a lie 
and be damned. Think of a just and righteous God deluding 
people in order to damn them ! The doctrine is certainly blas- 
phemous. It is enough to charge a demon with such acts as 
this. Some writers suppose that Paul did not mean what is 
here literally expressed ; but it is probable he did, for it is the 
old Jewish idea that every thing that takes place is the achieve- 
ment of a God. We must assume that the Devil, who now 
attends to such business, had not been sworn into office at 
that time. Hence he supposed that Jehovah still attended to 
such business. 

27. One indelible stigma on Paul's character is found in his 
indorsement of the pagan and Jewish rite of circumcision, — a 
cruel and bloody custom, — which no truly enlightened and sen- 
sible; man would lend his sanction to perpetuate, much less per- 
form with his own hands, as Paul did on Timotheus (Acts xvi. 
3). Paul also contradicts himself with respect to the matter, 
lie says, ••If yc be circumcised, Christ shall profit }'on nothing" 
(Gal. v. '1). Yet he afterward performed the act on Timotheus, 

Stated above. This is preaching one doctrine and practicing 
another. 

28. Paul said that he was a Roman citizen ; but no Jew could 
be a lull Roman citizen till the reign of Philip or Deems, long 
after. lb' also passed for Paul of Tarsus ; but Tarsus was not a 
Roman city at that time, nor until about a hundred years after- 



CHARACTER OF PAUL, AND HIS DOCTRINES. 415 

ward. This was being all things to all men in order to gain a few 
proselytes ; and truly he carries out the doctrine quite well. At 
one time he professes to be a Roman (Acts xxii. 2G) ; at another 
time he professes to be a Pharisee, and says that his parents 
were Pharisees (see Acts xxiii. 6) ; and then, again, he was an 
apostle of Jesus Christ (Acts xv. 10). 

29. Paul uses some rather dough} 7 arguments on the subject 
of the resurrection. He says that on the last day, at the sound 
of the trumpet, we shall all be raised, the dead in Christ first 
(1 Cor. xv. 52). We are also told that " this mortal shall put 
on immortality." We are compelled to believe, from the lan- 
guage here used, that Paul believed in the sleep of the soul in the 
grave ; and the resurrection of the natural body is a ridiculous 
absurdity and a physical impossibility. The sleep of the soul is 
a still worse assumption. Why should the soul lay in the ground 
covered with filth and worms? What possible benefit could 
it derive from laying in a state of insensibility for centuries ? 
And what would become of it if some one should remove the 
decomposed remains of the body, and all the earth contiguous, 
to some other locality, or toss it into a running stream ? And 
this has been done. What becomes of the soul in such a case? 
Does it float down the stream with the prrysical debris? If so, 
where will it stop ? and how will it be found in the day of resur- 
rection ? 

30. And his doctrine of his resurrection is attended with still 
greater difficulties and logical obstructions. The physical body, 
according to Paul, is to become a spiritual body. But a portion 
of the body is consumed by worms during the process of decom- 
position in the grave ; and those worms, when they die, are 
consumed by other worms. Will it not, then, require a search- 
warrant in the clay of resurrection to find all those worms, and 
to gather eveiy minute particle of the old body together to form 
the spiritual bod}' ? Why not make the new body of a stone or a 
stump, or some other material, instead of the old, decayed, de- 
composed body ? It would require a miracle in either case. Cases 
have been reported of Christian missionaries being eaten up by 
cannibals. The flesh of the Christian in such cases becomes a 
part of the physical body of the cannibal ; and the cannibal 



416 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

will, according to Christian theology, come forth unto " the 
resurrection of damnation," and will take a portion of the 
body of the missionary with him to the bottomless pit. 
How will it be obtained? A serious difficulty, certainly! 
How is it to be met and surmounted? Many other logical 
difficulties lie in the way of making a practical application of 
the doctrine. 

31. When Paul calls our physical tenements "vile bodies" 
(see Phil. iii. 21), he reveals the old pagan idea of the body 
being sinful. They looked upon it as a kind of prison for the 
soul, and a thing to be hated and contemned as j-ou would a 
tyrant with a rope around your neck. This error discloses 
great ignorance of the functions of the human body, and its 
relation to the soul or mind. It would be impossible to have a 
pure soul in a vile body. Here Paul discloses still further igno- 
rance of science. 

There are other acts and other erroneous doctrines, which mark 
the practical life of Paul, that are quite obnoxious to criticism ; 
as, for example, the curse he pronounced upon Elymas, whom 
he stigmatized as a sorcerer, though he does not prove he was 
one, but says that was his name by interpretation (Acts xiii. 
8). This act, which it is stated produced total blindness, 
must be regarded as an act of bigotry and intolerance. Elymas 
is not charged with any crime or immoral conduct ; and, so far 
as we can learn his histor}-, he was an honest, upright man : 
but he sought cc to turn away the deputy from the faith " (Acts 
xiii. 8) ; that is, like the Greek philosophers, he attempted to 
point out the absurdity of some of Paul's doctrines. There is 
something xrvy significant in the statement of Paul, that some 
of his doctrines were u to the Greeks foolishness" (1 Cor. 
i. 23) ; for they were a learned, intelligent, and sensible nation 
of people. And no such nation ever has, or ever will, accept 
as true and sound doctrine some of the theological nonsense 
and absurd doctrines which Paul preached. Future generations 
will wonder that such doctrines were ever taught by people 
claiming to be sensible and intelligent. 

The circumstance which Paul relates of a viper coming out 
of a bundle of sticks, and fastening on his hand without inflict- 



CHABACTER OF PAUL, AND HIS DOCTRINES. 417 

ing a deadly wound, evinces a degree of superstition which no 
philosopher could entertain. The assumption is, that God, after 
bestowing upon the reptile the disposition and means of defend- 
ing itself, interposed by a divine act to prevent their action. 

Christ and his apostles (including Paul) , instead of studying 
and understanding the laws of nature, were constantly looking 
for something to contravene them, and set them* aside. Of 
course the} ? were honest in this ; but it shows their want of sci- 
entific knowledge, which was characteristic of the age. 

The circumstance of Paul's handkerchief and apron heal- 
ing the sick, as related in Acts xix. 12, is evidently regarded as 
another interposition of divine power. But cases are frequently 
performed in this manner in various parts of this country by 
Dr. Newton and other healers, who impart their magnetic aura 
to a handkerchief, or some article of clothing, or a piece of paper, 
and send it to the sick, who are cured as effectually as those 
were by Paul's magnetized handkerchief; for it was undoubt- 
edly his magnetism imparted to the handkerchief that effected 
the cures. Modern science is solving the mysteries and mira- 
cles of the past. 

We will only observe further, that Paul lays down three 
systems of salvation, which, when arranged side by side, cer- 
tainly make the road broad enough to enable nearly every son 
and daughter of Adam to reach the heavenly kingdom : — 

Salvation by Faith. — "By faith ye are saved, and not of 
yourselves: it is the gift of God" (Eph. ii. 8). It being 
the gift of God, we, of course, can have no agency in the matter. 
" A man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law" 
(Rom. hi. 28). This is a direct contradiction of James, who 
declares, " Faith, if it hath not works, is dead" (Jas. ii. 17). 

Salvation by Works. — " God will render to every man 
according to his deeds " (Rom. ii. 6). " The doers of the law 
shall be justified" (Rom. ii. 13). Thus, it will be observed, 
Paul, in the above-cited texts, not only contradicts James, but 
contradicts himself. 

Salvation by Divine Predestination. — "As many as were 
ordained to eternal life believed " (Acts xiii. 48). This is not 
given as Paul's language ; but it is spoken with respect to his 



418 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

preaching. And Paul sets forth the same doctrine in Rom. xi. 
5 when he speaks of a remnant being " saved by the election 
of grace." Here, then, are three roads to heaven, which so 
multiply the chances of being saved that but few can be lost. 

Such conflicting statements show that confusion and ambiguity 
characterize the Bible, and render it impossible to learn any 
thing definite from its statements. 

Note. — How can Christians believe in the immortality of the soul after reading 
Paul's declaration that " God alone hath life and immortality dwelling in the light"? 
If so, then man is not an immortal being (see 1 Tim. vi. 16) . 

2. Character and Erroneous Doctrines of Peter. 

In his practical life St. Peter was a singular and angular 
being. He presents us with the opposite extremes of virtue 
and vice. He appears to have been about as distinguished for 
wickedness as for piety. He told the same falsehood repeat- 
edly, and backed it up with an oath (Matt, xxvi.) : hence 
lying, cursing, and swearing are laid to his charge. And then, 
we are told, he was put in possession of the kej^s of the kingdom 
of heaven (Matt. xvi. 19). How a man, guilty of such moral 
derelictions, could have had a higher honor bestowed upon him 
than was ever bestowed upon any other human being, or how 
he could have been considered a safe custodian for such an im- 
portant charge, it is difficult to see ; and then it looks too 
much like a bribe for immoral conduct. It weakens the incen- 
tives to a virtuous life to reward the criminal, and shows 
imperfection in the moral system which he was allowed to 
represent. As for his doctrines, they are characterized by the 
same moral and scientific errors and defects as those of St. 
Paul, and embrace some of the same doctrines of heathen 
mythology. 

1. He speaks of the earth as c - standing out of the water and 
in the water " (2 Pet. iii. 5). Here is the old Hindoo tradition 
Which taught that the earth floated on a sea of water, traces of 
which are also found in Genesis. 

2. He tells us, also, that the earth has been once destnryed 

by water, and in the day of judgment will be destroyed by fire 
(2 Pet. iii. <*>. 7). It has l>een from time immemorial a very 



CHARACTER OF PETER, AND HIS DOCTRINES. 419 

prevalent tradition amongst the Oriental nations that the world 
had been, and would be again, alternately destroyed. by water 
and fire. Peter and Josephus also seem to indorse this tradi- 
tion. 

3. Peter also indorses and teaches the absurd and unphilo- 
sophical doctrine of fore-ordination (1 Pet. i. 20). 

4. He also enjoins "servants to be in subjection to their 
masters," not only the good, but the froward (1 Pet. ii. 18). 
This is absolute tyranny. There is to be no resistance to the 
bloody lash. The motto of Patrick Henry is much better, — 
" Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." 

5. Wives are to be in subjection to their husbands (1 Pet. 
iii. 1), even as Sarah obeyed Abraham (verse 6). There is 
nothing said about husbands obeying wives, probably because, 
as he says, woman is the weaker vessel (1 Pet. iii. 7). Won- 
derful logic ! A sage conclusion for a Christian moralist. He 
thus places Christian morality below that of the ancient Druids, 
who placed women on a level with men in both Church and 
State. 

6. Peter tells us, " Christ bore our sins in his own body on 
the tree " (1 Pet. ii. 24) . This is the old Jewish idea of carry- 
ing away sins by scapegoats, and the Oriental heathen doctrine 
of putting innocent Gods to death as a punishment for the sins 
of the people, — a doctrine which posterity will condemn as bar- 
barous. (See " The Sixteen Crucified Saviors," Chapter xxi.) 

7. Peter says a " dumb ass spoke with man's voice " (2 Pet. 
ii. 16). He thus indorses the story of Balaam's ass becoming 
endowed with human speech. 

8. Peter, like Paul and Christ, indorses the absurd story of 
Noah and the flood (1 Pet. iii. 20). 

9. But space will not permit us to notice all the erroneous 
doctrines set forth by Peter. He teaches the doctrine of a gen- 
eral judgment (2 Pet. ii. 9), the doctrine of election and 
reprobation (2 Pet. i. 10), the doctrine of a general conflagra- 
tion of all things terrestrial (2 Pet. iii. 12). 

10. But the most remarkable incident in the life of Peter is 
his connection with the fate of Ananias and Sapphira. We 
find many logical absurdities and moral errors in this story re- 



420 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES, 

corded in Acts v. 1. It is very strange that Peter, who denied 
his Lord and master three times, and hence was repeatedly 
guilty of telling positive falsehoods, should be the chosen in- 
strument under Christ's religion to pronounce sentence of death 
upon Ananias and Sapphira for the same sin. 2. Why should 
Ananias and Sapphira be punished with death for a crime that 
Peter, Abraham, and Isaac were all guilty of several times? 
3. Is it not strange that Jehovah should be considered as being 
strongly opposed to lying, if he himself, as stated in 1 Kings 
xxii., converted four hundred of his prophets into liars, and 
then indorsed the tying Peter? 4. Is not the crime of Ananias 
and Sapphira — that of attempting to withhold a little money 
from the priests by tying — of less magnitude than that of ruin- 
ing a whole nation by robbery, as we are told God's hoty people 
did? The}' robbed and u spoiled the Eg3^ptians " (Exod. xii. 
36). 5. Is it not probable they needed it more than the 
priests did ? The moral law teaches that it is necessity, and not 
might, that makes right. 6. Does it not look rather unreason- 
able that Sapphira should repeat the same falsehood for which 
her husband had just been struck dead, as it must have been 
known to her? Who can believe it? 7. And can we suppose 
that God would be so partial as to kill a man and woman for 
the first offense of tying, and let Abraham, Isaac, and Peter, 
and others, escape after committing the sin several times? 
These considerations seriously damage the credibilit} T of the 
story. 



CHAPTER LXIII. 

IDOLATROUS VENERATION FOR BIBLES. 

" Should reason, science, and philosophic lore 
Against my faith combine, 
I'd clasp the Bible to my breast, 
Believing still that it's divine. 

Here 1 am told bow Christ hath diec 1 
To savr my soul from hell: 

Not- all the books <»n earth beside 

Such heavenly wonders tell. 



IDOLATROUS VENERATION FOR BIBLES. 421 

This simple book I'd rather own 

Than all the gold and gems 
That e'er in monarch's coffers shone, 

Than all their diadems. 

Nay, were the seas one chrysolite, 

The earth a golden ball, 
And diadems the stars of night, 

This book were worth them all." 

A Christian writer, in attempting to portray the Protestant 
view of the Bible, says, " It is a miraculous collection of mirac- 
ulous books. Every word it contains was written by miraculous 
inspiration from God, which was so full, complete, and infalli- 
ble, that the authors delivered the truth, and nothing but the 
truth. The Bible contains no false statements of doctrine or 
faith, but sets forth all religious and moral truth which man 
needs to know, or which it is possible for him to receive, and not 
a particle of error ; and therefore the Bible is the only authorita- 
tive rule of faith and practice. ' ' These two pious effusions — one 
in prose, the other in poetry — exhibit the views and feelings very 
prevalent among the disciples of the Christian faith only a few 
centuries ago ; and they are cherished yet, to a considerable 
extent, by a large portion of Christian professors. This blind, 
idolatrous veneration is gradually giving way to the light of 
science and general intelligence ; and the thick mental gloom 
and darkness of superstition out of which the}^ grow is being 
dispelled. When the intellectual mind becomes fully devel- 
oped and enlightened, the Bible will find its true level, and will 
command no more homage than other books. It will be read 
and estimated, like other human productions, according to its 
real merits. In this enlightened and scientific age, Bible devo- 
tees never go to such extreme lengths in pouring fulsome adula- 
tions upon the idolized book. They would be laughed at for 
their ignorance and superstition if they should attempt it. 
But the time has been when every religious nation which pos- 
sessed a u Holy Book " attached extreme sacredness and exalted 
holiness to the book and all its contents, and often indulged in 
the most extravagant language and the wildest rhapsodies in 
their attempts to eulogize and idolize its virtues. In this re- 



422 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

spect there was but little difference between Jews, pagans, and 
Christians : all idolized their Holy Books. A sacred regard 
was shown not only for the book, but often for every manu- 
script, scrap of paper, or text which it contained, or which was 
supposed to contain a message or revelation from God. But 
few religious nations have existed, even in the remote past, who 
have not possessed some kind of Bible or sacred record which 
they treated with an enthusiastic veneration bordering on idol- 
atry. The Hindoos, the Egyptians, the Persians, the Chinese, 
the Mahomedans, and the early Christians were all Bible idola- 
ters. The Hindoos, like the Christians, were religiously en- 
joined to read and study " the Holy Scriptures;" and the 
priests, as those in Christian countries do now, made them a 
stud}', and reduced the interpretation of them to an art. And, 
like Christians in another respect, they were interdicted from 
transcending in knowledge what was taught in their assumed- 
to-be divinely illuminated pages. The disciple of the Hindoo 
faith was not allowed to become ' ' wise above what was written ' ' 
in the Vedas (see chapter vi.) ; and the same solemn prohibi- 
tion, " Add not to, or take not from, the word of God," was 
reverently obeyed by the devout disciple of the Vedas. The 
Mahomedans believe the Koran has been received and trans- 
mitted from generation to generation by the direct agency of 
God. They claim that it is not only an infallible rule of faith 
and practice, but " God's last will and testament to man," and 
that it is designed by God for the whole human family : and 
they pray and hope for its universal extension and adoption. 
One pious Mussulman (Sadak), on being asked wiry the Koran 
appeared to be newer every time it was read, replied, " Because 
God did not reveal it for any particular age or nation, but for 
all mankind down to the Judgment Day." Mahomedans tell 
us that, ••such is the innate efficacy of the Koran, it removes 
nil pains of body and all sorrows of mind. It annihilates what 
is wrong in carnal desires, delivers us from the temptations of 
Satan and from {'cars. It removes all doubts raised by satanic 
influences, sanctifies the heart, imparts health to the soul, and 
produces union with the Lord of holiness. " With the ancient 
Persians the great test and touchstone of all faith and all 



IDOLATROUS VENERATION FOR BIBLES. 423 

moral action was their " Holy Word of God." To know 
whether a thing was right or wrong, they had only to inquire, 
" Is it taught, or is it forbidden, by the Zenda Avesta? " The 
Persians, like the Jews, had four days set apart in each month 
for religious festivals, on which occasions, Mr. Hyde informs 
us, " the}' met in their temples, and read portions of their Holy 
Books, and preached and inculcated morality and virtue " 
(chap, xxxviii. p. 352) . But Bible exaltation and adoration ran 
much higher than is here indicated in some countries. They 
were not only believed to be " words " or " the word of God," 
but to have a portion of the spirit of God impressed into every 
chapter, every verse, and every word ; and hence they received 
a portion of that veneration and adoration usually ascribed to 
Deity. And here we find both Jews and Christians have been 
strict imitators of the heathen in the practical exhibition of this 
species of book idolatry. We are told that the ancient Bud- 
hists ascribed inherent sacredness and supernatural power to 
the identical Sanscrit word of their scriptures. Hence it was 
considered sacrilegious to make any alteration in the arrangement 
of those words ; and, for fear some alteration of this kind 
might be made, they objected to the missionaries translating 
"the Holy Book" into the English language. Mr. Hyde in- 
forms us, they not only read their Bible in their temples, but at 
their festivals and in their families ; and, like the Jews and 
primitive Christians and the Mahomedans, they carried them 
in their travels, and slept with the Holy Book under their pil- 
lows. Nearly all Bibles in that age were treated with this kind 
of veneration. Brahmins, Persians, Jews, Mahomedans, and 
Christians, in their earlier history, were in the habit of attaching 
texts or detached portions of scripture to their clothes, or insert- 
ing them into their hats or shoes, — an act prompted by the 
belief that the}' would impart some supernatural charm ; and 
the Persians, Hindoos, and Mahomedans have been seen cov- 
ered from head to foot with scripture texts. In the days of 
St. Justin and St. Jerome such scenes were often witnessed 
among Christians also. Even the handling of the Bible was 
believed to impart a supernatural or miraculous power, mani- 
fested in the cure of diseases, driving away devils, (fee. Sev- 



424 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

eral Bibles were thus deified. In some nations they were kept 
under lock and key, or cloistered in a golden box, to prevent 
unsanctified hands from opening them. The notion was preva- 
lent with the devotees of several Bibles, that they should be 
read differently, if not held differently, from other books. 
Kissing the " Holy Book " was also prevalent among the Hin- 
doos, Mahomedans, and early Christians, — indeed, in nearly 
all religious countries. Bible worship knew no bounds in the 
days of ignorance and superstition, when people had more piety 
than philosophy. Believing that the spirit of God permeated 
their Bibles, nearly all the blessings of life were ascribed to their 
influence. Such a belief, fostered from age to age, and trans- 
mitted from parent to child, could but operate to blind the judg- 
ment of all Bible believers so as to disqualify them for detecting 
defects or perceiving their errors, though they may abound on 
every page. And these Bibles have been read by millions 
of their disciples with a kind of solemn awe or holy fervor, 
which not only wholly incapacitates the mind for perceiving 
its errors, but shuts out the possibilit} 7 of a doubt of its truth. 
Indeed, they glory in assuming it to be " a perfect embodiment 
of divine truth," " without the shadow of a shade of error from 
Genesis to Revelation," to use the language of Dr. Cheviot with 
respect to the Christian Bible. The reasoning faculties are put 
to sleep, and the intellect bound fast in chains, before " God's 
Holy Book ' ' is opened ; and if the reasoning faculties should 
by chance arouse, and rebel against such tyranny, and try to 
assert their rights by permitting a doubt to spring up in the 
mind Unit some statement or text is not true, the Bible devotee 
becomes alarmed, and exclaims, with trembling fear, tw Lord, I 
believe : help thou mine unbelief." In this state of fearful and 
prayerful menial strife against reason, doubt, and disbelief, he 
&gain sinks into the '-darkness of devotion," determined still 
longer to bug his canonized and idolized book to his bosom with 
all its errors and immoralities. This has been virtually the 
experience of thousands of Bibk believers, to a greater or less 
extent, in all ages and all countries in possession of wt Holy 
Books.' 1 In this way Bibles have been an obstacle to the 
progress of mind and the progress of society. An unchangea- 






SPIRITUAL OR IMPLIED SENSE OF BIBLES. 425 

ble and infallible book must inevitably cramp the mind, and hold 
it in chains. Hence a Bible-believing community can make no 
progress in morals, science, or civilization, only so far as they 
violate their own principles by transcending its teachings. 
Society would remain for ever in an ignorant, uncultured state, 
were there not some minds in it possessing a sufficient amount 
of intellect to outgrow their Bibles ; and, but for the publication 
and perusal of other books, society would make but little 
progress. A mind which is religiously and conscientiously 
bound to believe in a Bible is bound to all its errors and all its 
ignorance, and hence can make no progress while it adheres 
rigidly to its own principles or its own scruples ; but, thanks 
to the progressive genius of the age, the "Holy Books" which 
embody the moral and religious errors of the past are nearly 
outgrown, so that they are seldom read now even by their 
professed admirers. People are assuming the libert}" of becom- 
ing "wise above what is written" in "God's Holy Book." 
Even Christians themselves often assume this liberty : other- 
wise we should have a community characterized by ignorance 
and superstition ; and our writers would be as liable to stum- 
ble into errors and contradictions as the Bible writers w T hen 
they penned "God's perfect revelation." It requires the 
acquisition of but little knowledge and intelligence to become 
" wise above that which was written" in that illiterate and ig- 
norant age. 



CHAPTER LXIV. 

SPIRITUAL OE IMPLIED SENSE OP BIBLES. 

The practice seems to have been very early conceived and 
adopted in various countries by the disciples of different Bibles, 
which have been long extant in the world, of attaching to all 
the offensive texts of their sacred books (which, when taken 
literally, convey either a vulgar, immoral, or foolish sense) 
a new and more acceptable meaning than earlier custom had 



426 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

sanctioned, or more devout minds had ever thought of. As the 
growing intelligence of the people was constantly disclosing 
long-unnoticed and important errors in the Holy Book, this ex* 
pedient was adopted to cover them up, or put them out of sight. 
As Jesus, if not Paul, by virtue of the growth of the moral and 
intellectual perceptions, was able to distinguish some errors 
and moral defects in the first installment of Bible revelation as 
found in the Jewish Old Testament, so the people in every 
age since, in those countries where any cultivation has been 
bestowed upon the mind, have been capable of bringing to light 
numerous errors incorporated into the sacred books of past 
ages ; and as some of those books called Bibles were claimed 
by their disciples to be perfect, divinely inspired, and infallible, 
and consequently free from error, some expedient had to be 
devised to sustain this claim, and show that the man of science 
was guilty of falsehood when he charged " God's Holy Book " 
with containing errors. The expedient finally adopted was to 
take the long-established signification of the words of the text 
out, and put in a new meaning, coined by the prolific brain of 
the devout defender of the Book for the occasion ; and this new 
sense was called "the spiritual sense." It was presumed it 
would be more acceptable to the intelligent minds of the age. 
In this way, whenever a new scientific discovery has been an- 
nounced, demonstrating some of the statements of the venerated 
volume to be erroneous, the clergy have set themselves to work 
with their clerical force-pumps to extract the meaning which 
our standard dictionaries assign to the words of every text that 
seemed to conflict with the newly discovered scientific truth, 
and ingraft into it a new meaning of their own invention. This 
practice finally became, and has long been, an established prac- 
tice and art in nearly every country where a Bible has been 
known, whether Jewish, Pagan, or Christian. In fact, no 
nation having a Bible has omitted to practice it. 

No matter how vulgar, how disgusting, or how shocking to 

the better feelings, or how immoral the literal reading of the 

text, a hundred ways could be found to get rid of its offensive 

signification : a hundred spiritual interpretations could be thrust 
under its verbal coverings. The most senseless, the most in- 



SPIRITUAL OB IMPLIED SENSE OF BIBLES, 427 

decorous, and the most demoralizing verbiage could thus be 
made to pass for great "spiritual truths.' ' The pagans and 
the Jews practiced this art laboriously and extensively ; and 
the disciples of the Christian faith, in all ages of the Church, 
have been their strict imitators. That it is a very ancient heathen 
custom is evident from the declaration of "The Nineteenth 
Century," which quotes Plutarch as saying, "The spiritual or 
allegorical mode of interpreting words and language was applied 
to the poems of Orpheus, the Egyptian writers, and the Phry- 
gian traditions " (p. 337). Grote tells us that the plain and 
literal meaning would not have been listened to, as it did not 
suit the mental demands of the people. (See Grote' s "History 
of Greece.") He assigns this mode of interpreting sacred 
books to ancient Egypt ; and Mr. Wilson sa}'s the Christians 
caught the passion for spiritualizing and allegorizing their Bible 
at an early date, and of converting them on all occasions into 
spiritual mysteries, from the later Platonists, the example of 
Philo, and the Jewish rabbis. " The Mahomedans," Mr. Kant 
informs us, " gave a spiritual sense to the sensual descriptions 
of their paradise," and thus the Hindoos also interpreted their 
Vedas. "The Mahomedans," says another writer, "indulge 
in glowing allegories concerning love and intoxication, which, 
like some of the Hindoo devotional writings, seem sensual to 
those who perceive only the external sense, while the initiated 
find in them an interior meaning." The Greeks and Romans, 
according to the testimony of Mr. Kant, explained away some 
of the silliest legends of their polytheism by spiritualizing 
them, or giving them a mystical sense. Speaking in general 
terms, Mr. Ta}ior says, "An allegorical sense was the apology 
offered for the manifest absurdities of paganism." The Roman 
Julian once remarked, that the poetic stories concerning the 
Gods, though regarded as fables, he supposed contained a 
spiritual treasury. Kant declares, in like manner, that the 
ancient pagans "gave a mystical sense to the many vicious 
actions of their Gods, and to the wildest dreams of their poets, 
in order to bring the popular faith into agreement with their 
doctrines of morality ; " that is, they resorted to a spiritual 
interpretation in order to save them from being condemned as 



428 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

popular intelligence advanced. "All the learned ancients," 
sa}'s Mr. Iliggins, "gave their sacred writings two meanings, — 
one literal, and the other spiritual." Philo confessed that the 
literal sense of the Old Testament is c ' shocking : ' ' hence c c a 
divine science, believed b}^ intuition, is necessaiy to penetrate 
the hidden meaning." The Essenes declared, the literal sense 
of their scriptures was devoid of all power. Origen, finding 
Moses' writings replete with error and immorality, got rid of 
the difficulty by declaring, " It is all allegory." He makes the 
remarkable confession, that " there were some things inserted in 
the Bible as histoiy which were never transacted : ' ' hence he 
concludes they must be interpreted spiritualty, or set down as 
false. And St. Hillary declares, "There are many historical 
passages in the New Testament, which, if taken literal!}-, are 
contrary to sense and reason ; and therefore there is a necessity 
for a mystical interpretation." Not that we have an}- evidence 
that such an interpretation was ever thought of by the writer ; 
but this new and forced interpretation is the only alternative to 
save the credit of the Book. Any senseless expedient or sub- 
terfuge that could be invented was dragged in, rather than admit 
the Holy Book contained errors ; for this would prove it to be 
the work of man, and not of God. This has been the policy 
from time immemorial of the votaries of all sacred books. 
Origen — after declaring, " There is no literal truth in the story 
of Christ driving out the money-changers " — asserts that it is an 
allegory, indicating that we are to cast out our evil propensities. 
He says the early Christians seldom used the literal sense of the 
scriptures, because it taught something objectionable ; and, ever 
since the inauguration of this mode for concealing the errors and 
defective moral teachings of the Bible, all kinds of ridiculous 
interpretations of scripture have been resorted to by orthodox 
writers to make it teach what each one desired. Since they 
arrogated to themselves the liberty to depart from the literal 
meaning Of the text, hundreds of meanings have been ingrafted 
upon the same text by as maii3 r writers and readers; thus 
launching all scripture import upon the quicksands of uncer- 
tainty. The Rev. Mr. McNaught of England points to one 
text in Galatians — on which, he sa}'s, two hundred and forty 



SPIRITUAL OB IMPLIED SENSE OF BIBLES. 429 

meanings have been saddled by different Bible interpreters — as 
a specimen of this kind of license, that is, two hundred and 
forty guesses at the meaning : thus making Bible interpretation, 
and the system of salvation founded on it, an entire system of 
guess-ivork ; and I would suggest, that, if we have thus to guess 
our way to heaven, we can do so as well without the Bible as 
with it. A God who is so ignorant of human language as to 
give forth a revelation to the world couched in such unintelli- 
gible and ambiguous terms that no two people can understand 
it alike, it seems to us, should not have attempted it. All will 
be chaos and confusion and wild guess-work with respect to 
the meaning of a large portion of the Bible, while its readers 
are allowed to depart from the established meaning of words as 
defined by our dictionaries, and fabricate new meanings of their 
own. As for example : St. Andrew tells us, that, when Christ 
spoke of removing mountains, he meant the Devil ; and, when 
he spoke of selling two sparrows for a farthing, Bishop Hillary 
says he meant " sinners selling themselves to the Devil." The 
red heifer offered by Moses on the day of Pentecost was " spir- 
itualty Jesus Christ ; " thus identifj'ing Gods with beasts. The 
wool and hyssop used for sprinkling the people, we are told, 
means spiritualty, " the cross of Christ." Christ's injunction 
to hate father, mother, brother, and sister, &c, we are told, 
means that we must love them ; and many similar examples 
of manufacturing new meanings for obnoxious texts might be 
cited. 

Now, we ask, of what practical value can the Bible be, when 
there is no certain clew to its meaning, or when any of its read- 
ers, on finding a word or text whose literal signification does not 
suit their religious fancy, can assume the libert}^ to renounce 
the dictionary, ignore the common and established acceptation 
of words, and fabricate a new meaning contrary to, and in di- 
rect conflict with, the common signification? To get rid of some 
obvious error in the text, they bestow upon it airy kind of fan- 
ciful, and sometimes ridiculous, signification their imagination 
can invent, and then insist with a godly zeal that it is the in- 
tended meaning of the writer. If such lawless license in the 
use of words is to be tolerated, as Bible believers are in the 



430 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

habit of assuming, in order to make it teach something which 
they devoutly desire it should teach, then all rules with respect 
to the employment of language and the use of words are at an 
end : our dictionaries may be banished from the schoolroom. 
We will no longer have use for them if words are no longer 
the sjTubols of ideas, which must be the case if people are 
allowed to attach any signification to them they please, or as- 
sign them a meaning at variance with common custom ; and a 
person can learn as much by casting his e}'es over the blank 
pages of the book as by tracing its printed lines. And the art 
and labor of printing, so far as he is concerned, is superseded ; 
for, as he fabricates his own meaning, this can be done as well 
without type as with it. Mr. Ernstein, in his "Principles of 
Biblical Interpretation" (p. 37), affirms that "a proposition 
may be strictly true which is not contained in the words of the 
text ; " which is tantamount to saying, " The meaning exists in- 
dependent of the text, and is to be found outside of it : " so 
the text is not needed, and is of no practical use ; for the sen- 
timent of the text can be traced as well on the blank page. 
The unwarrantable license which Bible adherents assume of 
ingrafting new meanings into the words of a text when its 
literal reading shocks their moral sense by its immodesty, its 
falsi ty, or its puerility, would not be tolerated with respect to 
an}' other book ; and, if it is just and warrantable in this case, 
why not adopt it for interpreting the pagan Bibles, and thus 
spiritualize them into truth and harmony? It would take every 
objectionable statement out of them, and make them pure, un- 
mixed truth. With this kind of license a book can be made to 
teach any thing desired. Grant me the liberty that Christians 
assume in deviating from the established use of language, and 
coining a new meaning for words, and I will take all the infidel- 
ity out of "Tom Panic's writings," and make them chime with 
the smoothest and soundest orthodoxy. 

It should he home in mind that the custom of spiritualizing 
the apparently immoral and obscene portions of the Bible is 
something the common people know nothing about, hut suppose 
that Bible writers, in all cases, mean just what they say. Hence 
it is evident the practice has been attended with no practical 



SPIRITUAL OR IMPLIED SENSE OF BIBLES. 431 

benefit to society ; and Infinite Wisdom should have foreseen 
(and would if it had been his production) that the use of such 
language would have a demoralizing effect upon the world, and 
consequently would have made use of better language. Bishop 
Holbrook says that the notion of an inner sense to the Bible i« 
a mere creation of fancy, and will take the errors out of any 
book. And, as different writers differ in their mode of spirit 
ualizing the Bible, it proves it is a mere invention and forced 
expedient to save the credit of the Book. The resort to a 
spiritual sense for the Bible was simply an attempt to conceal 
its bad sense, — its nonsense, its vulgarity, its immoral teach- 
ings, and its numerous contradictions, which scientific and pro- 
gressive minds are constantly bringing to light. But it is as 
illusory and ineffectual as the ostrich hiding its head in the 
sand to evade its pursuers. In both cases the danger is blinked 
out of sight, but not removed. 

An}' sense of a text not clearly expressed or unequivocally 
indicated by the language, we claim, is a slander and a deroga- 
tion upon Infinite Wisdom, as it assumes he was too ignorant 
of language to be able to say what he meant, thus placing him 
lower in the scale of intelligence than a common schoolbo}' ; and 
assumes his priesthood are infinitely wiser, as they are able to 
reveal his " Holy Book " all over again, and thus make the nu- 
merous blunders of Infinite Wisdom plain and intelligible to 
common sense and the poorest understanding. 

I can not conclude this chapter without bestowing my thanks 
upon Emanuel Swedenborg for the service he has rendered the 
cause of truth and theological reform by an improved system 
of theology he has made out of the Bible, or rather out of his 
own brain. Being a man of unusual intellect and moral aspira- 
tions, and a man of considerable literary attainments, he could 
not brook the absurd system of theology taught in the pulpits, 
professedly drawn from the Bible. And whether his system is 
more conformable to the teachings of c ; the Holy Book " is a 
matter of no importance. It is in many respects a rational 
and beautiful system, and is thus far very acceptable, and must 
be very beneficial as a substitute for the irrational, and in some 
respects immoral, system taught by the orthodox churches ; 



432 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

and, were it universally adopted b}^ Christian professors, it 
would be a great improvement on the popular system, and a 
step toward the attainment of a true and perfect system. 



CHAPTER LXV. 

WHAT SHALL WE SUBSTITUTE FOR THE BIBLE? 

The disbelievers in Christianity in all past time, when object- 
ing to it as being fraught with too many moral defects to consti- 
tute a basis or guide for the religious opinions and moral actions 
of men in an age more free from superstition, and much farther 
advanced in a knowledge of the true science of morals and the 
general principles of philosophy, have been met with the reply, 
u Show us a better system before you pull down Christianity 
and throw aside the Bible. Let us know what you are going to 
substitute in their place." Very well, good friend, we will 
meet your objection, and hope we can remove the difficulty. 
We think that either of the following answers should prove 
satisfactory, and, all taken together, more than satisfactory : — 

1 . We do not propose or desire to destroy or supersede any 
valuable truth, precept, principle, or doctrine taught in the 
Bible, or to set aside any thing that can in any way prove to be 
practically useful. We only propose to sift out the errors from 
the truth, rejecting the former and retaining the latter, and to 
employ as many of the old timbers in constructing the new 
superstructure as arc not rotten or otherwise defective. 

2. Truth can not be "pulled down" or destroyed, as it pos- 

ii omnipotcncy of principle that is indestructible. Like 
gold in the refiner's crucible, it shines the brighter Tor every 
effort to destroy it. 

3. it must be presumed, therefore, that whatever portion of 
your religion is susceptible of destruction is false, and should 
he destroyed. 

4. It is the nature of truth to spring up voluntarily the mo- 
ment error is removed, as naturally as air or water rushes in to 



RELIGIOUS RECONSTRUCTION. 433 

fill a vacuum. The instant the clouds are rifted, the sun daj'ts 
down its vivifying rays upon the earth. You want no substi- 
tute for weeds when exterminated from your garden. When 
eradicated, those plants which are more useful and beautiful, and 
which they have been choking and repressing the growth of, 
will then assume a more healthy appearance. You ask no sub- 
stitute for sickness or disease, but desire it removed that you 
may again enjo}' the blessings of health. Moral health will 
likewise ensue by the removal of noxious weeds from the mind. 
And, finally, you can find a complete answer to this objection 
in your own Bible : u Cease to do evil, and (then) learn to do 
well ; " that is, the moment you discover an error in your faith or 
practice, abandon it, and you will soon " learn " what its proper 
substitute is. Truth is always at hand as a substitute for error. 
We may assume, then, that, if any of the erroneous doctrines 
now propagated were abandoned, they would find their own 
substitute immediately, as sickness finds its substitute in health. 
But we will not leave the pious Christian in this negative condi- 
tion, but will furnish him with a " substitute " which holds out 
much better hopes and promises than he has anchored in his 
idolized system, whether those hopes appertain to a virtuous and 
happy life here, or to an ever-blessed eternity beyond the con- 
fines of time. That substitute will be found fully explained in 
Chapter XIV., under the head of " The Infidel's Bible." Or, 
if he desires a system in fuller detail, and one possessing great 
beauty, let him examine the principles of u The Harmonial 
Philosophy.' ' 



CHAPTER LXVI. 



RELIGIOUS RECONSTRUCTION ; OR, THE MORAL NECES- 
SITY FOR A SCIENTIFIC BASIS FOR RELIGION. 

A philosophical analysis of the human mind, viewed in con- 
nection with the practical history of man from the early morn- 
ing of his existence, full}' demonstrates it as an important truth, 
that individual happiness and the moral welfare of society de- 



434 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

pend essentially upon the uniform action and harmonious co- 
operation of all the mental faculties ; and that, on the other 
hand, their individually excessive and inharmonious action con- 
stitutes the primary source of nearly all the crime, misery, and 
discord of society. And it may be well to note here, as another 
important preliminary truth, that the progressive development 
of the science of mental philosoplry has settled the division of 
the mental faculties into the following classification: viz., 
1. The animal, which imparts energy and impulsive strength to 
the whole character, mental and physical. 2. The social, which 
is the source of family ties and the social and co-operative insti- 
tutions of societ} 7 . 3. The moral, which makes us regardful 
of the happiness and welfare of other beings than ourselves. 
4. The intellectual, which is the great pilot-chamber or light- 
house of the whole mind ; though it is but recently that dis- 
coveries in mental philosophy have fully disclosed this as being 
its natural and legitimate office. It has thus demonstrated it to 
be the most important department of the mind. Its position in 
the cerebrum — occupying, as it does, the superior frontal lobe 
of the brain — might, however, have suggested this. Now this 
is no fanciful delineation, no mere ideal mapping of the mind, but 
has been demonstrated thousands of times, since the discoveries 
of Gall, to be the true condition and classified analysis of the 
mental faculties. The religious faculties constituting that de- 
partment of the mind which often controls our actions and 
conduct toward others, and being situated at the apex of the 
brain, — the point where the most intensified feelings and im- 
pulses are supposed to concentrate their misdirection or ab- 
normal exercise, is consequently attended with more direful 
consequences to society than that of any other portion of the 
mind. All history demonstrates this as a tragical fact; for 
religion, more especially, is always born blind. This being a 
tenable fact, and the religions faculties being awakened to ac- 
tion at an early period of human society, — before the intellectual 
chambers of the mind were lighted up by the illuminating rays of 
science, or supplied by a philosophical education and a thorough 
and untrammeled study of nature's laws, — their natural inten- 
sity of feeling, thus uncurbed and unenlightened, drove their 



BELIGIOUS RECONSTRUCTION. 435 

noncst but dark-minded possessors into the most senseless and 
childish superstitions, the most absurd doctrines, the most re- 
lentless intolerance of belief, and the most bloody and murder- 
ous persecutions ; thus proving that conscience unenlightened 
is a very unsafe and a very dangerous moral and religious 
guide. The popular Christian proverb, that "man can not be 
too religious," comprehends a very fatal error in moral ethics : 
for the man who possesses more religion than intellect, or more 
devotional piety than intellectual cultivation and philosophical 
enlightenment, is sometimes a more dangerous man to society 
than the highway robber or the midnight assassin ; because, 
alwa}'s finding niany accomplices to aid him in his direful deeds 
of bloody persecutions, and frequently being able, also, to in- 
voke the strong arm of the law, his work of defamation and 
spoliation, if not of open persecution and bloodshed, is wider 
spread than that of the burglar or the stealthy assassin. 

A review of histoiy shows us : 1 . That, up to the installation 
of the era of science, which dates back less than three centuries 
ago, the world — that is, the Christian world — was literally a vast 
prison-house of chains, and a theater of butchery and blood, — the 
result of a practical effort of men, devoutly pious, to " promote 
the glory of God," and the establishment of a supposed-to-be- 
true religion. 2. The perpetrators of those tragical deeds upon 
men and women were, man}^ of them, as religiously honest and 
conscientious c 4 as ever breathed the breath of life ; ' ' and they 
verily believed they were doing God sendee in thus punishing 
and exterminating dissenters and heretics. The very fact that 
some of these pious persecutors perished themselves at the fiery 
stake in the conscientious and unflinching maintenance of their 
principles, shouting " Hallelujah " while the burning fagots con- 
sumed their bodies, leaves no possible ground for doubt that 
a deep religious conviction had actuated them in the work of 
persecuting and punishing the enemies of their religion, and in 
attempting to convert the world to its ' ' saving truth ' ' by the 
sword. Much is said about " conscience," " the internal mon- 
itor," " the still, small voice," &c, as a guide for man's moral 
actions ; but, if experience and history ever proved or can prove 
any thing, they demonstrate most conclusively that conscience, 



436 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

unenlightened by the intellectual department of the mind, or a 
conscience grown up amid the weeds of scientific ignorance, is 
as dangerous a pilot upon the moral ocean as the helmsman of 
a ship, in midnight darkness, surrounded by dangerous shoals 
and resistless whirlpools. Conscience without science or phil- 
osophy is a lamp without oil, which consequently, being without 
light, is more likely to lead us astray than to guide us to the 
temple of truth. Science is the pilot-lamp b} 7 which we discern 
our way on the pilgrim-voyage of life ; while religion is the 
feeling, the motive-power, which impels us onward. Hence the 
latter should at all times be subservient to the former, and 
should be checked and restrained from spontaneous develop- 
ment and exercise until the former is duly installed upon the 
mental throne as ruler of the moral empire. It is as dangerous 
to cultivate and stimulate the religious feelings, until the fires 
of science or practical philosophy have been kindled up in the 
intellectual chambers to furnish the light necessaiy to guide them 
in their impulsive course, as it would be to steam up the boilers 
of a boat when approaching a precipice in the night, with the 
pilot asleep upon his hammock, and all the lights extinguished 
in his chamber. Neither religion nor conscience possesses pri- 
mordiahy any light of its own. Both are born blind ; and all 
the light they ever possess is b} 7 reflection from the intellectual 
light-house. Prolific, indeed, of the proof of this statement, 
are human nature, human experience, and universal history. 
Let the policy, then, be, in all cases, to cultivate science before 
religion. The intellectual mind, we repeat, should be thorough- 
ly cultivated and enlightened before the religious feelings are 
called into action. 

Query. Reader, what do you now think of Dr. Cheviot's 
statement, * w The Uible does not contain the shadow of a shade 
of error from Genesis to Revelation ." 



CONCLUSION. 437 



CONCLUSION. 

SEVERAL IMPORTANT POINTS. 

1. As this work was announced several years ago, it seems 
proper to explain the causes of the long delay in its pub- 
lication. Want of health for completing it, and want of means 
for publishing it, furnish the true explanation. But by the prac- 
tical application of a remedy constituting a new and extraordi- 
nary discovery in the healing art, the author's health has so far 
improved as to enable him to resume the work, and re-write 
nearly the whole of it in a few weeks time. The work advei- 
tised embraced but forty pages. The present volume comprises 
nearly eleven times that number of pages, and includes only 
two chapters of the original, except the small portion which has 
been re-written. 

2. While " The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors " was de- 
signed principally to trace the doctrines, traditions, and miracu- 
lous events of the Christian Bible to their primary pagan or 
Oriental origin, the main object of " The Bible of Bibles "is to 
expose their logical absurdity, and the evils resulting from their 
propagation and practical application. 

3. The objection is frequently raised in this work against 
placing the Bible in the hands of children, and also in posses- 
sion of the heathen. This would, of course, keep it out of our 
common schools ; and the author rejoices in knowing, that, 
although the Bible was used as a regular school-book in his 
youthful days, it has been banished as a text-book from nearly 
every schoolroom throughout the country. This denotes prog- 
ress. 

4. Christian professors regard it as a sufficient refutation of 
all the arguments and facts designed to prove and demonstrate 
the immoral influence of the Bible upon society, to assert that 



438 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

Christian countries are superior in morals to those not in posses- 
sion of their Bible. But many facts cited in this work tend to 
prove, that, if the assumption were correct, it could not with any 
show of reason or sense be attributed to the influence of the 
Bible. It is clearly, if not self-evidently, impossible that such 
" moral or immoral lessons as are derived from the history of such 
characters as the father and founder of the Jewish nation (Abra- 
ham) , who is represented as living up to all the commands, all 
the statutes, and all the laws of God (see Gen. xxvi. 5), while 
practicing the abominable crimes of treachery, deceit, falsehood, 
incest or adultery, and polygamy, &c, — I say it is morally impos- 
sible for such examples and such lessons to exert other than a 
demoralizing influence upon society ; or that of David, pro- 
nounced " the man after God's own heart," while practicing a 
long catalogue of the most shocking crimes (see chap. xxx). 
Such cases blasphemously represent God as sanctioning the 
most atrocious crimes and the most revolting deeds, which is a 
virtual licence to the whole human race to practice them. If a 
book containing such lessons does not exert an immoral influence 
upon society, then human language, when employed in writing 
Bibles, fails to make its ordinary impression upon the mind. 
But we will here cite three cogent and incontrovertible historical 
facts, which will settle the matter at once and for ever, by proving 
the truth of our oft-repeated proposition, that the Christian Bible, 
notwithstanding the apparent improvement in morals of most 
Christian countries in modern times, has, on the whole, tended 
to demoralize every nation where it has been generally read, be- 
lieved, and practiced. First, look at the moral condition of the 
whole Christian world during the period known as ct the Dark 
Ages." and you will sec the proof in overwhelming torrents. 
During that long night of moral darkness and human depravity, 
which lasted nearly a thousand years, all Christendom was reek- 
ing with mora] corruption, and practicing the most abominable 
crimes. Lying, deceit, hypocrisy, moral treason, licentious- 
ness, adultery, fornication, fighting, and drunkenness were the 
order of the day among all classes, including the clergy and the 
d.'.'icons. -imply because the light of science had not reached 
them, and the Bible was their sole guide in morals and religion. 



CONCLUSION. 439 

This state of things continued until the introduction of Greek 
literature dispelled the thick clouds of mental darkness, and ar- 
rested the swift tide of moral corruption. Second, the Greeks 
without our Bible were both morally and intellectually superior 
to any Christian nation. Third, "■ the Dark Ages " were brought 
to a close by the introduction of Greek learning and Greek mor- 
als into Christian nations. This dates their first tendency to 
rise out of the sloughs of heathen barbarism, and their first ap- 
pearance of moral improvement. And thus the proposition is 
proved and demonstrated b}' the facts of history that the Bible 
continued to demoralize society till its influence was arrested by 
the dawn of moral and physical science. In no nation has there 
been an}' marked improvement in morals with the use of the 
Bible alone. 

5. It will doubtless be regarded as an extraordinary circum- 
stance that so many thousand biblical errors as are disclosed in 
this work should have passed from age to age unnoticed by the 
millions of disciples of the Christian faith, and more especially 
the startling fact that all the cardinal doctrines of the Christian 
religion are founded in error. But it should be borne in mind 
that it was regarded and taught as a religious duty to suppress 
and conceal all such errors, and absolutely wicked, sinful, and 
dangerous to admit the possibility that the Holy Book can con- 
tain errors. And this negative policy alone was sufficient to 
keep them concealed and out of sight. 

6. It is stated in chapter thirty that none of the Old Testa- 
ment writers teach the doctrine of immortality or the doctrine of 
future rewards and punishments. The proof and a full elucida- 
tion of this subject will be found in u The Biography of Satan." 

7. It is stated m chapter fifty-five that all human language 
is more or less ambiguous and uncertain, and in chapter fifty-two 
that skillful linguists of this age can construct language whose 
meaning can not be misunderstood ; and hence God should 
have been able to do so when the Bible was written. The first 
statement refers to language as ordinarily used when the Bible 
was written, and especially the imperfect Hebrew of the Bible. 
The last statement implies that with the modern improvements 
language can be so employed as to leave no doubt of its mean- 
ing in any case. Both statements, then, are correct. 



440 THE BIBLE OF BIBLES. 

8. The author, in abridging citations from history and the 
Bible, has in some cases deviated from custom in using quota- 
tion-marks. This is especially true of chapter twenty-two (on 
Bible contradictions) . 

9. It is believed that no errors of any importance can be 
found in this work, unless some mistakes have been committed 
in making scriptural references. 

10. j&gT'Each reader of this work is desired to examine care- 
full}' and critically the author's exposition of " The Twelve Car- 
dinal Doctrines of the Christian Faith," and report to him his 
views .of that exposition. Those twelve leading doctrines are 
embraced in the twelve chapters commencing at chapter 33 (on 
revelation) and ending at chapter 44 (on a personal God) . 



THE WORLD'S 

SIXTEEN CRUCIFIED SAVIORS; 

Or, Christianity Before Christ. 

CONTAINING 

New, Startling, and Extraordinary Revelations in Religious History 

which disclose the Oriental origin of all the Doctrines, Principles, 

Precepts and Miracles of the Christian New Testament, and 

furnishing a key for unlocking many of its Sacred 

Mysteries, besides comprising the History of 

Sixteen Oriental Crucified Gods, etc, etc, 

BY KERSEY GRAVES, 

Author of "The Biography of Satan,' 1 and "The Bible of Bibles; or, Twenty- 
Seven 'Divine Revelations.' " 



This wonderful and exhaustive volume by Mr. Graves will, we are certain, take 
high rank as a hook of reference in the field which he has chosen for it. The 
amount of mental labor necessary to collate and compile the varied information 
contained in it must have been severe and arduous indeed, and now that it is in 
such convenient shape the student of free thought will not willingly allow it to go 
out of print. But the book is by no means a mere collation of views or statistics ; 
throughout its entire course the author follows a definite line of research and argu- 
ment to the close, and his conclusions go, like sure arrows, to the mark. 



Printed on fine white paper, large l2mo, 384 pages, with portrait of author, $2,00, 

postage 10 cents. 

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THE 



Biography of Satan: 

OR, 

A HISTORBCAL EXPOSITION 

OF 

THE DEVIL AND HIS FIERY DOMINION. 

IB-y ±k.EE,SE"Z" GBAVES, 

Author of "The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors," "The Bible of Bibles; or, 
Twenty-Seven ' Divine Revelations ,' " etc. 



This work discloses the Oriental origin of the belief in a Devil and Future 
Endless Punishment. Also, the Pagan origin of the Scriptural terms, Bottomless 
Pit, Lake of Fire and Brimstone, Keys of Hell, Chains of Darkness, Casting out 
Devils, Everlasting Punishment, The Worm that Never Dieth, etc., all explained. 



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